MADISON — Gov. Tony Evers today is set to take action on 33 bills. The bills the governor is expected to sign today include keeping kids safe on school buses, authorizing forest fire suppression products derived from soybeans, which provide an environmentally friendly alternative to per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS)-based products, and creating and providing one-time funding for a new grant program to support organizations providing housing services to homeless veterans, among others.
Among the 33 bills Gov. Evers will take action on today includes:
Senate Bill 367, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 146:
- Prohibits insurers from requiring healthcare providers to accept reimbursement payments by virtual credit card payment, reducing unnecessary financial costs to healthcare systems, which especially impacts smaller, independent, and rural providers.
Senate Bill 822, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 147:
- Establishes that discounts offered by a healthcare provider to an individual covered under a health insurance policy are exempt from s. 146.905 if the healthcare provider does all of the following:
- Offers the discount for prompt payment for products or services, but without regard to the issuer of the individual’s health insurance policy or the individual’s reason for seeking the covered product or service;
- Notifies the issuer of the health insurance policy of the prompt payment discount policy by posting the most up-to-date version of the discount policy on the health care provider’s website; and
- Provides a discount in an amount that bears a reasonable relationship to the amount that the healthcare provider avoids in collection costs by prompt payment and is no more than 15 percent of the fee owed.
- Clarifies that these provisions do not in any way supersede contracts between providers and insurers, require providers to provide discounts, or authorize providers to offer a discount that conflicts with any existing federal laws.
Assembly Bill 192, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 148:
- Establishes fatality review teams under state law, providing a consistent approach for fatality review teams and creating language clarifying the confidentiality of their work, which will both improve the teams’ work on death reporting and protect confidentiality for the deceased.
Assembly Bill 19, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 149:
- Makes several changes that extend protections related to adults at risk, including:
- Allowing an adult at risk seeking a restraining order to appear in court via telephone or live audiovisual means;
- Creating a penalty enhancer for crimes committed against an adult at risk;
- Adding victims who are adults at risk to the crime of battery to an elder person;
- Increasing the penalty for sexual assault of an adult at risk; and
- Adding adults at risk to the procedure that allows a court to freeze or seize a defendant’s assets if charged with a financial exploitation crime.
Senate Bill 191, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 150:
- Requires that a subpoena may only be served upon a law enforcement officer, Tribal law enforcement officer, public officer, or public employee at their work address if the testimony is related to events or actions taken in their official capacity or within the scope of their employment.
Assembly Bill 238, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 151:
- Extends nondiscrimination protections to dog handlers accompanied by search and rescue dogs in hotels, inns, motels, and tourist rooming houses;
- Prohibits lodging establishments from denying accommodations, charging higher rates, or displaying discriminatory communications toward dog handlers with properly identified search and rescue dogs; and
- Clarifies handlers’ responsibilities for sanitation and damage and aligns lodging policies with those already in place for service animals.
Assembly Bill 239, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 152:
- Adds search and rescue dogs to the list of animals included in the crime of harassment of police and fire animals.
Assembly Bill 596, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 153:
- Appropriates $950,000 annually to a new state per diem grant program created under Assembly Bill 597 to provide funding to organizations providing housing services to homeless veterans.
Assembly Bill 597, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 154:
- Creates a new state per diem grant program to provide funding to organizations providing housing services to homeless veterans.
Assembly Bill 659, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 155:
- Reduces the residency requirements for the tuition and fee remission program available to certain veterans, spouses, and children who are enrolled in University of Wisconsin System institutions and technical colleges from five years to three years; and
- Modifies the non-resident tuition exemption by removing the requirement that a veteran must be a Wisconsin resident at the time of entry into active duty, while maintaining residency at the time of enrollment.
Senate Bill 521, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 156:
- Requires the placement of directional signs along eastbound and westbound US Highway 18 for the Mount Horeb Veterans Memorial.
Assembly Bill 155, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 157:
- Designates and requires the Wisconsin Department of Transportation (WisDOT) to mark US Highway 12 in the village of Lake Delton in Sauk County as the “Tom Diehl Memorial Highway” to recognize the contributions of Tom Diehl, who played a large role in shaping the success of Wisconsin’s tourism industry.
Assembly Bill 562, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 158:
- Requires WisDOT to procure and erect signs for the Mississippi River Trail if each municipality located on the route has adopted a resolution in support of the trail and its route through each respective municipality; and
- Allows WisDOT to request funding for the signs from the Joint Committee on Finance without a finding that an emergency exists.
Senate Bill 783, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 159:
- Expands eligibility under Wisconsin’s Commercial Driver Training Grant program by allowing applicants other than training providers to receive grants when they pay for a third-party provider to deliver qualifying commercial driver license training; and
- Modifies existing program requirements to provide greater flexibility in how training is arranged, while retaining federal compliance standards and limiting grants to one per individual trainee.
Senate Bill 391, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 160:
- Allows for the use of audiovisual recording devices on school buses with the approval of the school board or the governing body of a private school, a Tribal school, or a charter school authorized under s. 118.40(2r) or (2x) to provide a safe environment on school buses for students;
- Requires notice of the policy allowing audiovisual recording devices to be provided to parents and students, as well as posted clearly in the bus; and
- Stipulates that recordings made shall remain confidential and may be used by only school officials and law enforcement personnel for investigations, school disciplinary actions, and criminal prosecution related to incidents occurring in or around the bus.
Assembly Bill 679, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 161:
- Enables WisDOT to issue $325 overweight permits to transport grain, commercial feed, or bulk fertilizer on routes designated by state and local officials, allowing for Wisconsin’s agribusinesses to take fewer trips, lessen vehicle emissions, save costs on fuel, and relieve pressure on overworked truck drivers.
Assembly Bill 425, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 162:
- Allows for the transport of manufactured homes on trailers or undercarriages using a transporter license plate; and
- Changes the current law term “modular housing unit” to “modular home.”
Senate Bill 556, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 163:
- Expands the utility aid program to provide payments to counties and municipalities that host certain energy and liquefied natural gas storage facilities that are exempt from local property taxation, helping to meet growing and future energy demand in Wisconsin.
Assembly Bill 619, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 164:
- Authorizes the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation (WEDC) to certify no more than one business that manufactures biofuel, a majority of which is aviation biofuel, under the existing enterprise zone program to receive up to $120 million starting in taxable years, beginning after Dec. 31, 2025;
- Defines biofuel as fuel that has been created by converting organic matter derived from wood, at least 80 percent of which has been sourced in Wisconsin as measured by aggregate volume over a five-year period, helping to bolster the pulpwood market in Wisconsin and supporting Wisconsin’s forestry products industry.
“This bipartisan legislation will create hundreds of high-paying jobs in rural communities, while positioning Wisconsin as a national leader in the production of Sustainable Aviation Fuel,” said Gov. Evers. “By leveraging our state’s strength in forestry products, Wisconsin is well-positioned to meet demand in this growing market, providing a high-value, low-carbon energy source that will drive economic growth and environmental progress.”
Assembly Bill 657, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 165:
- Creates a sales and use tax exemption for qualifying fusion equipment and other project inputs that are exclusively and directly used in a nuclear fusion technology project and used solely at the project location.
Assembly Bill 696, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 166:
- Modifies various requirements for the certified public accounting examination and practices as a certified public accountant upon licensure or certification in other states, modernizing certified public accounting licensure by adding flexible pathways that better balance education and work experience, and aligning Wisconsin with other Midwest states to encourage more individuals to enter the profession.
Senate Bill 898, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 167:
- Adds two registered pharmacy technicians to the Pharmacy Examining Board, increasing the board’s size to a total of nine members.
Senate Bill 832, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 168:
- Allows any pharmacy to operate as a remotely supervised pharmacy, so long as such a facility abides by rules issued by the Pharmacy Examining Board to help pharmacies, especially rural pharmacies, recruit pharmacists and prevent reduced hours or closures in underserved communities.
Assembly Bill 605, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 169:
- Allows the owner or operator of a municipal solid waste facility to retain some environmental repair fees if the owner or operator receives a Clean Water Fund Program loan for wastewater treatment infrastructure, while the loan is in repayment, providing necessary, sustainable financial support to local wastewater systems as they pursue PFAS remediation efforts.
Assembly Bill 713, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 170:
- Requires battery stewardship organizations to collect and recycle covered batteries, prohibits the sale of covered batteries in certain circumstances, requires the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) to review battery stewardship plans, requires battery stewardship organizations to pay an annual $75,000 fee to the department, and provides a penalty for violating the provisions of the bill.
Assembly Bill 911, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 171:
- Appropriates $150,000 in fiscal year 2026-27 to the DNR for a battery collection and recycling program; and
- Creates an appropriation for expenditure of all funds received by the department as fees from battery stewardship organizations, as required in Assembly Bill 713.
Senate Bill 798, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 172:
- Directs the DNR to establish a wetland assured delineation program, codifying a successful pilot program that has been operating since 2005.
Assembly Bill 453, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 173:
- Requires cities and villages to grant rezoning requests for the purposes of residential housing development if certain conditions are met;
- Requires cities and villages, every five years, to identify areas in their comprehensive plans in which residential land use is projected and outline the minimum and maximum residential units per acre that will be authorized; and
- Allows cities, under certain conditions, to extend the life of Tax Incremental Districts for up to two years for housing stock improvement from the one-year extension allowed by current law.
Assembly Bill 884, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 174:
- Allows the Wisconsin Department of Revenue to serve as an agent of the Wisconsin Department of Administration for purchasing contractual services to meet federal fingerprinting requirements; and
- Clarifies certain provisions of the film production tax credit and the conditions under which individuals who are at least 67 years old may claim the income tax subtraction for retirement income.
Assembly Bill 813, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 175:
- Modifies the existing Opportunity Attraction and Promotion Program by eliminating the grant program and requiring WEDC to sponsor applications for major opportunities and events initiatives; and
- Expands the types of opportunities and events that may be sponsored and caps the amount that may be expended related to major opportunities or events that are not open to the public at 25 percent of the total amount of moneys for the program.
- This bill streamlines the program’s existing process, making it easier for applicants to access WEDC funding in a timelier fashion so they can better compete to attract events to the state.
Assembly Bill 778, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 176:
- Makes changes to the eligibility for the Transitional Jobs and Transform Milwaukee Jobs programs by repealing the requirement that individuals be unemployed for at least four weeks prior to participating in the program and the requirement that program participants be ineligible for unemployment insurance benefits; and
- Specifies that anyone who has not filed for unemployment benefits or who has filed but is found to be ineligible may participate.
- This bill allows more young adults and parents to participate in the programs that successfully provide job opportunities, training, and services to unemployed individuals.
Senate Bill 501, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 177:
- Creates a veterinary loan repayment program, administered by the Higher Educational Aids Board, to provide assistance for veterinarians employed in rural counties.
Senate Bill 474, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 178:
- Authorizes forest fire suppression products derived from soybeans, which provide an environmentally friendly alternative to PFAS-based products and do not leave chemical residues in groundwater, as an eligible product under the Forest Fire Protection Grant program administered by the DNR.
