10/25/2026
💰⚾️💰To Tax or not to Tax? 🤔🤔
Are you a baseball fan? I am actually from Wisconsin, born in Milwaukee. ⚾️⚾️⚾️
The history of professional ball parks in Wisconsin is curious. The former Milwaukee County Stadium was home to the Brewers and for 3 games a season, the Green Bay Packers. Green Bay has a population of less than Lambeau Stadium, imagine that, and the fans more than fill that Stadium every game. The wait time for someone to obtain season tickets is a ridiculous 💛💚 50 years, some parents put their kids' name on the season ticket wait list when they are born. Many of the fans are from the larger populated Milwaukee area, thus the Packers would play in their fans home town 3 times a season. I attended a game there long ago. It was so interesting to see them turn a ⚾️ field into a 🏈 field. Both teams had their bench on the same side of the field to fit the football field.
Fast forward to the early 1990's. Bud Selig was both owner of the Brewers and the baseball commissioner (temporary, his service lasted for years, how does that work). He wanted a new Stadium. They went to tax payers to ask for a sports lottery to pay for the Stadium, tax payers said no thanks. How did the Brewers end up with a luxury Stadium? Read on:
In April 1995, Wisconsin voters rejected a statewide referendum to create a sports lottery (proceeds dedicated to athletic facilities, including a new Brewers stadium). It failed by about 64% to 36%.
The Brewers (playing in aging Milwaukee County Stadium under owner Bud Selig) had signaled they might leave without a modern ballpark with a retractable roof, luxury seating, and other amenities. After the lottery defeat, state officials (led by Gov. Tommy Thompson) pursued an alternative: a 0.1% sales tax in five southeastern counties (Milwaukee, Ozaukee, Racine, Washington, and Waukesha) to cover the public share of a roughly $250 million stadium (originally planned as about $160 million public / $90 million from the team).
In October 1995, the bill failed twice in the Wisconsin Senate. After a long overnight debate stretching into the early morning of October 6, Republican State Sen. George Petak of Racine switched his vote on the third attempt. This produced a 16-15 passage. Petak had previously opposed including Racine County (the Racine County Board had voted unanimously against the tax) and had voted no on the earlier tallies; he changed course after efforts to exclude Racine failed and amid concerns the team would relocate.
The legislature created the Southeast Wisconsin Professional Baseball Park District, which imposed the tax (starting in 1996) to back bonds for construction. Petak was recalled in June 1996 and defeated—the first successful recall of a Wisconsin legislator—largely over this vote.
Construction began in late 1996. The stadium (Miller Park) opened in 2001 (delayed a year by a July 1999 crane collapse during roof work that killed three workers). It was later renamed American Family Field. The five-county sales tax ultimately raised roughly $600 million before ending around 2020; total project costs exceeded original estimates due to overruns, financing, and related expenses.
Constructionowners +2
In short: the rejected lottery referendum was followed by legislative approval of a regional sales tax via Petak’s decisive late-night switch, which secured the public funding, kept the Brewers in Milwaukee, and cost Petak his seat.
