Too bad it still isn't the days of wine and roses like the last 8 years! THOSE apparently were the good old days. The situation we are in now happened only in the last 6 months. Everything before that was just fine. (shrouded in sarcasm).

Hey, unless someone else with common sense is willing to run for office, all we have are the idiots in Madison. One party is a bad as the other.

I did not vote for any of these tax and spend liberals either. But the majority did and thats whats so sad. Are you people who voted for these idiots that stupid or just hoping the goverment gives you more? If you want to live on the goverment dole please move to Cuba or some other nice socialist country. Because those of us who choose to work our azzes off are getting tired of supporting yours. Another fee just what we needed let me bend over and see it I can fit another fee up there....nope won't fit. Tax Fee spend liberal agenda...get rid of these people. Doyle is not running again what do you think the chances are that he can take the rest of his sheep with him?

local government isn't getting any of the phone fees. The last fees was suppose to go to local governments to update fire and ems programs, radios, etc. and when they tried to get the money to update a local police dispatch center were told that the Gov. took the money out and used it other places.....so here we go again.......

"Ah, the democratic way- Tax and spend. Remember we voted for it."

Unless you've got a frog in your pocket you can take the "we" out of that sentence. "I" could see this coming a mile away and didn't vote for any of these socialists that we've got running the state or the nation. I'm just saddled with everyone elses bad choices.

Taxes aren't socialism. All countries have taxes.
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The article says $50 million per year, which is actually around $4 million collected per month. That may seem like a lot but it's spread out over every local jurisdiction in the state. Rock County should get around $1.3 million on a strict population formula, but that will be further split among the municipalities. Janesville will probably get around $450,000. That's not enough to fund a single ambulance. But it will keep your property taxes down some.

if you don't have a receipt for "police and fire protection fee", does your house burn down?

there are approx 304,000,000 mil people in the US - National Cell phone use is over 153,000,000. Thats just over 50% -It stands to reason then with WI having a pop of 5,600,000 - there would be about 2,800,000 cell phones- Do you realize that over $2,000,000 PER MONTH for just Cell phone lines in WI. This is insane. Reminds me of the old saying "you throw a frog into a pot of boiling water & they jump out, put him in a cold pot but bring to a slow boil & it will sit & be cooked to death. We have to get this spending/taxing under control before we're all cooked.

Ah, the democratic way- Tax and spend. Remember we voted for it.

fee, tax. all the same. don't cut waste, just tax, tax, tax.

anyone else smell a hint of socialism coming from around the corner?

It's Obama's fault!!

"But as the budget problem grew, the Legislature instead decided to divert the money to local governments to reduce pressure on raising property taxes."
Divert is actually the correct word. They simply re-named the TAX and called it a FEE. Don't let these actions fool you. The real cost of government taxation is much higher than our politicians would like you to believe.

Look at you cable bill once...The breakdown on that is even worse than the phone. $70 in actual services, and $50 for 'other' stuff. By the way $.75 translated into real billing by your phone company will probably come out to a $5.00 charge because they need to pay for the extra hassle of taxing you on top of the usual Federal, State and Local screwing you get.

so the ten dollars in taxes and fees i am already paying every month on my landline wasnt enough?

Change you can beleive in. Actually, change that you have to give to your phone company now, that you can beleive in! More change to come, or more change to go (to tell the truth!)

wake up america. haven,t you had enough of this so called change..... vote these tax and spend liberals out and take back our country.

Hooray! More taxes!

Another tax, when are we going to uprise and control the governement on there spending, it is time to reduce the spending, (like take a pay cut)now with the tobacco tax here and people stop smoking and chewing where are they ging to get the money for it. The none users. Wisconsin people need to vote someone in who knows how to run a business.