MADISON – Senator Eric Wimberger (R-Gillett) released the following statement today after Governor Tony Evers signed Assembly Bill 130 and Assembly Bill 131 into law, legislation he authored with Representative Jeff Mursau (R-Crivitz) to address PFAS contamination in communities across Wisconsin:
“After years of work, we successfully bring comprehensive legislation to fight PFAS contamination across the finish line for Wisconsinites. Acts 200 and 201 are the result of countless collaborative hours with affected communities, groups, and landowners from across the state. My deepest thanks and appreciation go out to everyone who helped us get the bills signed into law today.
At the heart of our reforms is an idea: the State should not treat landowners who discover PFAS contamination on their property like polluters. Through meetings and negotiations, that idea transformed into real policy that will protect innocent victims of PFAS across Wisconsin from unfair state action.
With a unanimous vote in the Legislature on a complicated and controversial subject, $133 million in relief is on the way to help communities across Wisconsin remediate pollutants. From French Island to Marinette and Madison to Stella, we’ll soon begin the important work of identifying and fighting PFAS contamination in lands and waters across our state.”
Assembly Bill 131, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 201, creates PFAS-specific grant programs to help communities get additional resources to address contamination. These include $80 million to support impacted communities’ efforts to fight PFAS and $35 million to expand the Well Compensation Grant Program to include PFAS.
Act 201 also provides changes in statute to help impacted communities and landowners test, identify, and remediate PFAS, as well as additional protections for innocent landowners who find PFAS on their land that they did not cause, such as farmers, residential and commercial properties, and some industries.
Assembly Bill 130, now 2025 Wisconsin Act 200, funds these new resources and initiatives with approximately $133 million from the PFAS Trust Fund, created in the 2023-25 State Budget.
Last session, Governor Evers vetoed a similar bill authored by Senator Wimberger that would have provided innocent landowner protections and allocated $125 million set aside by the Legislature for PFAS relief.
