Rep. Ryan Clancy (D-Milwaukee) speaks before a vote on a housing-related bill in the state Assembly Tuesday. (Screenshot/WisEye)

A group of housing bills that Republican lawmakers have fast-tracked since they were first announced two weeks ago made it through the Wisconsin Assembly Tuesday — most with unanimous support, but not without criticism from Democrats.

In a floor speech before the Assembly began voting Tuesday, Rep. Kalan Haywood (D-Milwaukee), assistant minority leader, said the GOP housing package fell short of what might have been possible with bipartisan discussion.

“While there is support for many of these bills on our side, we are by no means satisfied,” Haywood said.

Haywood complimented the Republican chair of the Assembly’s Housing and Real Estate committee, Rep. Robert Brooks (R-Saukville), for his “willingness to listen and work together.”

He described bills enacted in the 2023-24 session as “a bipartisan housing package that we could build on this session,” and said that in the spring, bipartisan work had begun on a new round of bills, accompanied by “honest communication with both sides and with stakeholders.”

Those discussions stopped abruptly in June, Haywood said, and when the bills came out two weeks ago the results were “half baked.”

“There are some good things in these bills that may help create some additional housing, but we could have done much more,” Haywood said.

A series of procedural votes on the floor Tuesday surrounding one bill — AB 455, creating a grant program for condominium conversions from multi-family homes — was emblematic of the gap between how Democrats and Republicans viewed not just the legislation but the larger issue of housing.

In the Housing and Real Estate Committee meeting Friday, Oct. 3, Rep. Ryan Clancy (D-Milwaukee) managed to persuade three Republicans to join the panel’s Democrats to pass an amendment that expanded the bill to include housing cooperatives, not just condominiums.  

After the amendment was adopted, Sen. Steve Nass (R-Whitewater) sent an email written in red to all state lawmakers of both parties, mocking Clancy’s amendment as applying to “communes” and criticizing its Republican supporters.

When the bill reached the floor Tuesday, the original author, Rep. Dave Murphy (R-Greenville), submitted a rewrite, known as a substitute amendment.

The rewrite included another amendment, from Democrat, Rep. Lori Palmeri (D-Oshkosh), giving tenants of a building being converted to condos the right of first refusal to purchase their residence. But it omitted the Clancy amendment.

“We had a brief and awesome moment of bipartisanship this last week, and then we had an all red email from Senator Nass,” Clancy said on the Assembly floor. “I did not realize that my Republican colleagues were beholden to him and not even their own leadership there.”

The substitute amendment, Clancy said, would “strike out this bipartisan amendment and just turn it into another handout to developers.”

Brooks, the housing committee chair, had announced at the Republican press conference before the floor session that cooperatives would be stripped out, calling the approach “very difficult to manage because of the financing mechanisms and other things.”

Clancy said he would vote for the legislation despite the removal of his amendment. “But it is so disappointing to have to do that because we had something better in front of us,” he added.

The bill, like most of the bills up for a vote Tuesday, passed on a voice vote.

Others that passed with broad support included AB 424, updating requirements for the rental of mobile and manufactured homes; AB 451, allowing cities and villages to designate residential tax incremental districts to help fund infrastructure improvements; AB 452, allowing land subdividers to certify their designs and public improvements comply with state requirements; and AB 456, making a variety of changes to real estate transaction practices.

A handful of measures labeled as housing bills passed with little or no support from Democrats.

AB 453 would require local communities to grant rezoning requests for housing developers if they meet certain conditions, including that the area is projected as residential in the community’s comprehensive plan. The party-line vote was 55-39.

Rep. Mike Bare (D-Verona) said the measure fell short of what could have been done and that it lacked funding for local governments that would have to bear the cost it would impose. The bill’s author. Rep. David Armstrong (R-Rice Lake) vowed to seek funding in the next state budget.

AB 450 would put off the effective date of Wisconsin’s updated commercial building code until April 1, 2026. Originally blocked in 2023, the new code was reinstated by the the Department of Safety and Professional Services (DSPS) after a state Supreme Court ruling this July held that state laws allowing the Legislature to block executive branch administrative rules indefinitely were unconstitutional.

The current effective date is Nov. 1.

Rep. William Penterman (R-Hustisford) said delaying the code further was needed “for clarity” because builders had been planning projects under the previous code.

After the GOP majority rejected an attempt by Democrats to replace the bill with language that increased funding for DSPS on a 54-41 party-line vote, the legislation passed on a voice vote — but with substantial, audible cries of “No” from Democrats.

AB 366 would allow landlords to demand a written statement from a licensed health professional attesting to a tenant’s need for an emotional support animal.

“There are numerous people that have contacted us about the fraudulent means of how you can get a service dog,” state Rep. Paul Tittl (R-Manitowoc), said at a Republican press conference before the floor session.

On the floor, Clancy criticized the bill for potentially harming people for whom emotional support animals are a necessity but who are unable to see  a health professional.

“To the extent that there is a problem, where we want to actually certify that some animals are supportive and some are not, we can fix that problem,” Clancy said. “But that requires actually talking to the stakeholders before taking pen to paper.”

A builder frames a house under construction. An Assembly committee advanced a dozen bills Thursday, with several aimed at expanding the construction of affordable workforce housing. (Spencer Platt | Getty Images)

A dozen bills, some aimed at addressing the need for affordable workforce housing according to their Republican authors, passed the Assembly’s Housing and Real Estate Committee Thursday, with all but three gaining bipartisan support.

Several of the measures have already been put on the tentative calendar for the Assembly floor session scheduled for Tuesday, Oct. 7.

AB 182, would modify Wisconsin’s low-income housing tax credit and require the Wisconsin Housing and Economic Development Authority (WHEDA) to ensure that 35% of the tax credits it allocates are for projects in rural areas of Wisconsin.

AB 449 would require local municipalities with zoning to permit accessory dwelling units on the property of existing single family homes.

AB 451 would create residential tax incremental districts, to encourage residential developments with the resulting increases in property tax collection used to fund infrastructure investment. That measure passed the panel 12-2.

AB 454 would establish a workforce home loan fund through WHEDA to provide gap financing for new construction or significant rehabilitation of a single family home for the borrower.

AB 455 would establish a grant program at WHEDA for the owners of apartment buildings to offset converting their properties to condominiums. In an unanimous vote, the committee approved an amendment from state Rep. Lori Palmeri (D-Oshkosh) requiring grant recipients to give current occupants in a building being converted an opportunity to purchase their unit.

State Rep. Ryan Clancy (D-Milwaukee) persuaded a majority of the committee, including four Republican members, to adopt an amendment allowing the proposed grants to be used for conversions to housing cooperatives as well as condominiums.

“Housing co-ops are an important alternative for households in our communities that lack the means to individually purchase and maintain stable housing,” Clancy said in a statement issued after the vote. “They provide the assurance of predictable costs, create the potential for innovative forms of cost sharing and cost reduction, and help strengthen the communities that embrace this well-proven model.”

Clancy’s statement also included a thank-you to the Republicans who voted with the committee’s five Democrats to pass the amendment, as well as the committee chair, Rep. Robert Brooks (R-Saukville), “for giving my proposed amendment to AB 455 a fair hearing.”

Clancy’s statement prompted Sen. Steve Nass (R-Whitewater) to email Republicans and Democrats in both chambers castigating Clancy and the Republicans who voted for his amendment for adding “communes” to the bill.

Four other bills involved largely technical matters, one lowering real estate transfer fees, one updating the requirements for renting mobile homes, one enabling subdivision developers to certify that improvements comply with state requirements, and one on changes in real estate practices for single- to four-family homes. All passed with unanimous or nearly unanimous votes.

Divided on party lines

Committee members split on a bill that would allow landlords to demand a written statement from a licensed health professional attesting to a tenant’s need for an emotional support animal.

The bill’s author, state Rep. Paul Tittl (R-Manitowoc), asserted at a public hearing that there was a “rising trend of emotional support and service animal misrepresentation in Wisconsin.” All nine committee Republicans voted for the bill and all five Democrats against it. 

On a second party-line vote, a bill giving developers an automatic rezoning right for residential projects if they met certain conditions passed with only the Republicans voting in favor.

The committee also passed on party lines legislation that would put off the effective date of Wisconsin’s updated commercial building code until April 1, 2026.

The building code update had been blocked in 2023, but a state Supreme Court ruling this July held that state laws giving the Legislature the power to block executive branch administrative rules indefinitely were unconstitutional.

After the Court’s ruling, the Department of Safety and Professional Services moved ahead to promulgate the new code, originally setting a Sept. 1 starting date. The department later postponed the effective date to Nov. 1.

In addition to the committee’s 9-5 vote Thursday on the bill postponing the date again, 29 Republican lawmakers sent DSPS Secretary-designee Dan Hereth a letter Wednesday also seeking to postpone the effective date to April 1.