by Mike Hall, May 5, 2011
Paying back his corporate donors and allies and sticking it to working families once again, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) signed a bill that overturns Milwaukee’s paid sick leave law.
The law was passed with a 70 percent vote in 2008 and Milwaukee corporate interests soon filed suit against it, but in late March, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals upheld the law. Today, Walker went to the headquarters of the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce (MMAC), the business group that tried to block the law, and signed the bill that preempts all Wisconsin communities from approving ordinances requiring paid sick days.
The bill was passed at the urging of the MMAC by the Republican-controlled legislature and specifically designed to block the Milwaukee law. Dana Schultz, lead organizer for 9to5, the National Association of Working Women, says Walker’s action is “an assault on democracy, local control, and working families.”
Voters can see that the governor and state legislature are more committed to paying back their corporate donors than creating good jobs for Wisconsin.
Milwaukee Area Labor Council President Shelia Cochran says state government should be working “for the people that elected them, not for a narrow group of corporate interests.”
The governor and his associates have disregarded the will of the voters, the decision of the court and opened the door to reverse local control wherever they see fit.
Walker’s action comes just days after he cynically announced a program to recognize state employees for their hard work—the same workers whose collective bargaining rights he stripped—and after he appointed a union-busting attorney to head the Wisconsin Employment Relations Commission.
Here’s a scary question. Who’s his next target?
