>> The following program is a PBS Wisconsin Original
production. >> A settlement over
polluted water still leaves many left in the wake, and
a wave of tax credits looks to alleviate a strained
rental housing market as inflation costs surge.
[MUSIC] I'm Frederica Freyberg.
Tonight on "Here& Now", the real cost of cleaning up
toxic forever chemicals. Then the leader of the
state's housing authority on helping fund affordable
rental units. We hear about the state of the state's
health and the cost of state university tuition
going up. It's "Here& Now" for June 12th.
>> Funding for "Here& Now" is provided by the Focus
Fund for Journalism and Friends of PBS Wisconsin.
>> After trading new airstrikes with Iran this
week, President Trump suddenly announced a deal
was imminent and could be signed this weekend. This
comes after inflation reached a new high since
the conflict began. Wisconsin's U.S. senator
spoke with WPR this week, responding to questions
about high fuel costs and fertilizer prices for
farmers. >> A lot of them don't have
the money right now to fill their tanks for planting
season and then fertilizer. Many of our farmers are
having to do without the full complement of
fertilizer that they need for their fields. This is
going to have ramifications for months and months to
come. And our farmers work harder than anyone I know.
So, you know, there may be a glitzy rally that the
president holds in Wisconsin, but that does
nothing to deal with the real harm our farmers and
ultimately the American consumers of their products
will have to deal with. >> In June of 2022, because
of President Biden and the Democrats policy, they're
waging the war on fossil fuels. Average gasoline
prices were $5 a gallon. Yeah. I don't like the high
fuel prices, the high fertilizer prices. Nor does
President Trump know, nor do any of us. But I also
recognize that what would be far worse is if Iran
became a nuclear power and they wiped out our grid.
That would be orders and orders of magnitude worse
as well. So hopefully this is just short term pain. It
is painful, I recognize that, but that's why the
sooner this war, the sooner we win this war, the better
for everybody. >> Tyco Fire Products
reached a settlement this month with the state of
Wisconsin to clean up PFAs contamination in Marinette
County. Tyco manufactured firefighting foam that
spread the forever chemicals in soil and water.
The settlement requires Tyco to put $10 million
into Wisconsin's PFAs Trust Fund for future cleanup.
Provide clean water in the Marinette area, including
deep drinking water wells in a prescribed area for 20
years. Monitor and report water quality within the
35mi'!S that includes parts of the city of Marinette
and the town of Peshtigo, and requires Tyco to
remediate and restore the environment in soil,
groundwater and surface water. Another lawsuit
against the company and others is ongoing for
reaction to the PFAs settlement. We turn to Jeff
Lamont, a resident in Marinette and a retired
hydrologist. And Jeff, here.
you for having me. >> So how long in coming
was this settlement? >> They found PFAs on their
fire training facility three and a half to four
years before they reported it to DNR, which violated
the spills law. And they let the community drink
this contaminated water for four years before reporting
it. So, yeah, we're seven years in. We were first
informed of the contamination in November
of 2017. So it's almost been ten years.
>> But in your mind, this settlement barely touches
the problem. >> Yes. So the settlements
were not happy at all about because what it did,
essentially it said there was the initial
investigation area and then there was an expanded
investigation area. And for ten years the DNR had
fought with Tyco about the responsibility beyond this
essential first area that was investigated. The
contamination was the same. I mean, we're talking in
places where it's neighbors right across the street.
Well, we're going to take care of you on this side of
the street. But the other side of the street, that's
not our contamination. And this lawsuit limited their
liability to just the initial investigation area
and not the expanded investigation area or the
3000 acres of of contaminated biosolids that
was spread in Marinette County.
>> But isn't the settlement a $125 million in state
funding and potential of an ongoing lawsuit? Starting
point better than nothing. >> It is better than
nothing. But if you want to put that in into
perspective, Tyco has set aside $180 million just for
this site. So, I mean, we're just one of many, you
know, dozens, if not hundreds in the state that
are impacted. So it really does not go very far. And
the deep wells Tyco has been putting in
approximately $100,000 a piece. So if you look at
another $10 million, that might address another 100
wells in the community beyond the initial
investigation area that are still contaminated with
their PFAs. >> So you have experience
in large scale cleanups with the EPA. What, in your
experience should be happening?
>> Well, you know, I try to let the citizens of our
community know that these are very, very long, drawn
out processes. I mean, a lot of the Superfund sites
that I worked on had been in the gears for ten, 15,
20, sometimes 30 years before the remediation
actually went into place or started. And often these
remedial efforts can take multiple years. The, the
Waukegan Harbor cleanup I did, we were there for 7 or
8 years from once we started the the project.
>> So can PFAs, these forever chemicals, can they
be removed, remediated, make people safe.
>> They can be. There's. There's a number of
technologies and as. And as PFAs has become such a huge
problem countrywide, a lot of companies have started
to invest a lot of money in different techniques to
clean up. You know, Tyco chose, in my opinion, a
very ineffective solution. They did a pump and treat
system to to remove shallow groundwater and treat it
with granular activated carbon. And, and, and
resins. And it can remove that. But there are more
practical ways. They're more expensive. They're
reactive barrier walls are one that is being used a
lot these days on Air Force bases and, and in different
communities across the country. But Tyco chose, in
my opinion, a very ineffective method to
address this. >> Do you hold out hope
that that this will be adequately remediated in
Wisconsin? >> Not a lot with with
without significant, you know, outpour and outcry
from the public. It's just it's such a costly endeavor
that unless there's a responsible party like we
have Tyco Johnson controls, this is going to fall on
the taxpayer. And, you know, there's only so much
resources in the state budgets for this kind of
thing. And like we talked about earlier, $135 million
is kind of a drop in the bucket, really, but it is a
starting point. So I should be more optimistic, I guess,
for that. >> All right. Well, we will
leave it on that note. Jeff Lamont, thanks so much.
>> Thank you so much. >> Affordable rental
housing across the state is getting a boost with the
Wisconsin Housing and Economic Development
Authority announcing nearly $50 million in housing tax
credits to developers that are expected to create
rentals for up to 5000 people from working
families. For more on this, we are joined by WHEDA CEO
Elmer Moore RFK, Jr. Thanks very much for being here.
>> I am delighted to be here and share with you
some of the good news of the work we've been doing.
>> Where is the need most acute for affordable
rentals, and will these developments be located in
those areas? >> You know, an interesting
thing about housing in today's environment is that
it's acute everywhere. The need for affordable housing
is experienced in rural and small, urban and in the in
the city centers. And so wherever we can make
strategic investments in in the form of housing tax
credits across the state, they're going to be
desperately appreciated. >> And these developments
and developers will be working across the state.
>> Absolutely. It's 35 developments. You know, one
of the realities is that we have not seen a tax credit
development in all 72 Wisconsin counties, but in
in this instance, we're going to be looking at 26
communities across the state, which is actually
pretty, pretty successful. >> What is the definition
of affordable? >> I'm so glad you asked
that. And I'm going to give you two definitions. When
we talk about affordable housing, usually what we're
referring to is what I refer to as capital A
affordable, which means a subsidized housing
development that is rent restricted to people with
incomes 80% or below of the area median income. These
are often financed with tax credits or other public
sources. The other side of affordability is really
just housing that occupies no more than 30% of a
family's income. So we have started a conversation
about affordable housing with that capital A also
housing that people can afford, which might be
unrestricted. But it's it's not necessarily as
expensive as what we have historically called market
rate. >> I was just going to ask
if this is a model that has worked historically.
>> The the light tech program, the low income
housing tax credit program was a bipartisan effort
from 1986. This was Ronald Reagan's administration's
work. It is well understood as the most successful
private public, private public partnership in in
our country's history. It has generated hundreds of
thousands of rental housing units and homeownership
units across the country. For WHEDA alone, we're
talking 61,000 units have been created using the the
housing tax credit program. You know, we have deployed.
Are you ready for this number, $644 million in
just tax credits? That has really moved the needle,
and it has incentivized the investment of communities
and developers in the form of housing across the state.
>> How does a lack of such kind of affordable rental
units affect the economic health of the state, not to
mention the needs of lower income renters?
>> That is playing out in the form of diminished
health outcomes. There's an aspect to educational
outcomes. Everything that we care about in our
society is impacted by whether or not people have
safe, stable housing. If they can't afford the
housing that they are occupying. And very many
people, something like 60% of renters are in housing
that actually is considered unaffordable. They are rent
burdened. The economic outcomes is they're not
able to make very key investments in things that
will support them thriving, whether that's childcare,
investing in their own education, access to health
care, whether it's the choice between paying rent
or putting gas in your car so you can get to work on
time. Housing is at the very core of how we
experience life. >> Is it the expectation,
though, that because of declining working age
population, the need for new housing units like this
will also decline? >> Unfortunately, that
There's multitudes of housing, whether it's
senior housing, family housing, housing for people
with special physical or cognitive needs. In
Wisconsin, 60% of the housing is more than 40
years old. You know, I live in a house that's 120. And
I can guarantee you, when those craftsmen were
building that structure, they didn't necessarily
plan for me to be living in it. 120 years later, that's
how housing has always been. We are in a crisis because
housing is unaffordable. We aren't producing enough of
it, and what we have is often aging out.
>> Well, Elmer Moore, we leave it there. Thank you
so much for joining us. >> I'm so grateful. Thank
you for your time. >> Turning to health news,
20% of Wisconsinites are self-reporting poor or fair
physical health, and 1 in 7 say the same of their
mental health. This is according to the new state
health assessment, which comes out every five years.
The Department of Health Services is looking for
ways to fill in the gaps. Steven Potter spoke with
the state health officer, Paula Tran for Moore,
beginning with what the report is measuring.
>> Overall, we are measuring the things that
shape Wisconsinites health as well as the health
outcomes. So we're looking at things like demographic
factors who lives in Wisconsin, where they live.
We're also measuring the main causes of death, and
we're also looking at all of the factors that really
shape an individual's ability to be healthy and
well, like economic factors, looking at housing, looking
at affordable access to resources that people need,
like food and transportation, as well as
their access to health care directly.
>> What are the most significant health concerns
facing Wisconsinites? >> Yeah. Well, we know that
Wisconsinites are dying younger than before the
pandemic, and we know that there's a lot of challenges
for Wisconsinites in accessing both the daily
resources that they need to be healthy and well. So
healthy food, having safe, secure housing, having
transportation to get them to where they need, as well
as having good access to affordable care where they
need it, when they need it. >> One of the key points in
your new report is that Wisconsinites feel that
there are major obstacles to them receiving health
care. They need to be healthy. What are those
barriers? >> Yeah, some of the
barriers are costs, and access to insurance
actually covers all the kinds of care that they
need, and cost and insurance kind of go
together. And we know that most people access
insurance through their employer. So if they are
experiencing gaps in employment, that might
insurance and their for their access to care. When
we look at care directly, we know that in parts of
our state, there are gaps in kinds of care. So
hospitals have closed over the last several years and
more rural areas. And even in urban areas, we're
seeing clinics and other health care providers
closed down or just just based on, you know, the
challenges it takes to run a health care organization.
So both getting to care in a way that's accessible and
access can be defined again, by cost, by being able to
drive to the care or and also having the right kind
of provider for the care you need.
>> A large number of residents rated their own
health as poor or fair. About 20% of residents said
that. Why are they feeling this way?
>> Yeah, it again, when we look at all of the
challenges that Wisconsinites are facing,
we know that overall costs are rising across not just
health care, but all daily living needs. So that is
putting a stress on families. And because our
incomes are also being impacted and not rising as
quickly for some, with the inflation of other costs,
Wisconsinites are being forced to choose between
these really important things that they need,
whether it's putting food on the table with
medications or accessing care because there's a
co-payment that they cannot afford. So all of those
things are contributing to how Wisconsinites are
feeling and to their health outcomes, that we continue
to be challenged around obesity, obesity,
hypertension that causes a whole host of chronic
diseases. So there are both the drivers of health that
are causing more stress for Wisconsinites and accessing
the things that they need to be healthy and well are
also exacerbating and allowing other health
outcomes to persist. >> Along the lines of with
mental health. What did your report find?
>> Yeah, we know that Wisconsinites are
struggling, they're experiencing stress, and
they're also reporting that their mental health is is
poor. And when they need supports around mental
health, it's very difficult to access the kind of
mental health care that they need. And we know our
mental health care environment has a lot of
room to improve around coordinating around
different kinds of care, receiving the right
referrals for the care you need, and all across the
care continuum, making sure we are coordinated so that
at any part of the entry of that continuum, folks are
accessing early and not allowing some of those
challenges to persist, to become worse and
potentially be in crisis situations.
>> Your report also measures some good things.
Residents who vote, volunteer, or do favors for
others. Why is it important to measure these things and
what did you find? >> Yeah. What the current
evidence tells us is communities that are more
engaged and active and connected to each other,
the healthier those communities are. It both
helps from a mental health perspective. But when in a
community, a neighbor is in need of something, they're
much more likely to be able to have community support
be responsive to those needs. So there's a lot of
different reasons why community connectedness and
community engagement and being civically involved
helps a community stay healthier and access the
resources it needs. So that's an absolutely great
finding for us that more Wisconsinites are feeling
like they help others and others help them when
they're in need. >> The cost of attending
University of Wisconsin schools is going up in the
fall. This month, the UW Board of Regents approved a
2% tuition hike for in-state undergraduate
students, plus roughly commensurate increases in
fees and room and board that will put UW-Madison at
$12,416 on the high end, and UW Parkside at 8851 at
the lowest price point. It's the fourth tuition
increase in a row after a ten year freeze. In the
midst of increasing cost pressures on families, how
reasonable is the tuition hike? We're joined by
professor in the UW-Madison Department of Education
Policy, Taylor Odle, and thanks for being here.
>> Thanks for having me. >> So a 2% tuition hike on
paper seems really modest, but at a time, as we said,
when people questioned the value of a college degree,
does it turn some people away?
>> I think it's very important to acknowledge
that a 2% increase is very real money for students and
families. I think at the same time, we also have to
acknowledge that costs are going up for all of us,
including organizations and businesses like the
Universities of Wisconsin. 2% is relatively modest and
predictable, and below the rate of inflation right now
doesn't mean it doesn't, you know, have important
conversations about dollars and cents at the end of the
day. But what students and families should really care
about is the net price of college. So when you quote
that $12,000 or that $8,000, that's what we call the
sticker price, what you see on the website. But from
that, we know people get grants and scholarships,
and that pulls it down to what we call the net price,
the check that you have to write at the end of the day
to be able to enroll. And that number has actually
been relatively flat over the last several years
because UW is taking money from these tuition
back into financial aid. >> With a 30% decline in
highest paying international students and
volatile federal research funding. What is a
university to do except use that tuition lever?
>> That's a great question. UW the universities of
Wisconsin have three primary revenue sources,
right? Federal grants, which we are among the top
in the nation at securing. We enroll students who pay
tuition and fees, and we receive funding from the
state. State support has long stagnated, with the
exception of a recent increase. And so tuition
dollars are a primary way of raising funds. With a
tuition freeze for many, many years, our ability to
do that was hamstrung. And so it quite literally
strangled some of the campuses. We benefit from
having international students and even students
from out of state who pay higher tuition rates
because they can afford it. They are mobile geographic
for colleges with a decline in international student
enrollment. There aren't many other students that we
can look to except for our in-state students,
especially now because the state has begun to
increasingly regulate our ability to even draw
students from Minnesota and Iowa and other out-of-state
partners. >> So how kind of in
jeopardy are the finances of the Universities of
Wisconsin given all of these factors?
>> It's a very serious position, right? We've
already seen campus closures of many regional
campuses. We've seen cuts to academic programs. We've
seen staff and faculty restructurings. And so no
one wants to raise prices. If you're a business owner,
you don't want to walk out and show your customers
raising prices. The university doesn't want to
do that either. We want more people to access and
have access to a college education. Like you said,
for upper social and economic mobility. But when
the state is no longer a primary funding partner,
federal research and grants landscape is certainly
uncertain. Tuition is one of the only lovers left.
>> So some Republican state policymakers are super
angry about this tuition increase, saying it's, you
know, the fourth in a row after a state budget gave
the system $256 million. What about that persuasion?
>> Yeah, I think the average Wisconsinite should
also be super angry about that characterization. So
256 million is a big number and it's a very important
investment. It's however, a biennial increase. So we
have to divide that by two because it's going to be
the 120 something million every year. And just to put
that in context, the university leverages its
the state's largest public employer, and its operating
budget is around $7 billion. And so that increase is
less than almost 1.5%, so substantially below
inflation. And more importantly, that $256
million came with a lot of important caveats. Most
importantly, an unfunded tuition or salary raise for
faculty and staff across the institution. So no
other piece of state government has unfunded
mandates in that same way. So we're required to raise
salaries by 2% for all faculty and staff. But the
state didn't put in the money to fully fund that
raise. And so the Regents have said that the tuition
increase will predominantly fund faculty and staff
salary increases mandated. >> Well, that's another
piece that some policymakers are unhappy
about, because they say the number of staff has gone up,
whereas the number of students has not.
>> So many people, when they think about staff
increases on cross campus. We use this federal survey
where we report people in these huge buckets. Do they
teach? Do they work? Are they administrative in
different ways? It doesn't capture the granularity of
what those staff are actually doing. So if we
hire more students to provide career exploration
or oversee internships for students or help them get
placements with employers, those are staff members and
those are very valuable staff members. I'd be happy
to double or triple those numbers. And so it's a
really nuanced conversation, right? Are there
efficiencies to be had? Of course, but we need to have
better data and a more frank conversation around
what staff are actually increasing.
>> All right. Well, we leave it there. Taylor Odle,
thanks very much. >> Thanks.
>> For more on this and other issues facing
Wisconsin, visit our website at PBS
wisconsin.org and then click on the news tab.
That's our program for tonight. I'm Frederica
Freyberg. Have a good weekend.
[MUSIC] >> Funding for "Here& Now"
is provided by the Focus Fund for Journalism and
friends of PBS Wisconsin.