Jason Stein

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

MADISON - Contractors won't have to work with unions on taxpayer-funded building projects and parents will have an easier time getting an anti-seizure drug derived from marijuana, under legislation Gov. Scott Walker signed Monday.

The measure on labor agreements, which passed the Legislature on party-line votes, is the latest in a series of moves to roll back union power by Republican lawmakers in recent years. Walker signed the law at Amerilux International, a De Pere distributor of construction materials.

The cannabis oil legislation is a bipartisan measure aimed at helping children who can suffer from scores of seizures in a single day.

Project labor agreements establish wages and other conditions for certain projects. Walker said the legislation will protect taxpayers by ensuring local government "neutrality" when it comes to those agreements.

“By forbidding state and local governments from requiring contractors to enter into agreements with labor organizations, we’re promoting healthy competition between contractors," Walker said in a statement. "This means the contractor ultimately chosen for the project is the one that has demonstrated excellent service and will work at good value for Wisconsin taxpayers."

Republicans were critical of the agreements put in place for plans to build a $500 million arena for the Milwaukee Bucks that is being partially funded by taxpayers. GOP lawmakers say project labor agreements will still be allowed, but companies just won't be required to adopt them.

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But Democrats say Senate Bill 3 will interfere with the ability of local governments to get the best value for projects in their area. Unions say such agreements provide skilled workers who do quality work and make living wages.

Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett said in a statement that the agreements are sometimes needed to ensure big projects are completed on time and to deal with "quality control, health and safety, and productivity problems."

"These types of agreements can enable costs to be more tightly controlled and ensure that there are no disruptions to the construction schedule, for example from strikes. These factors far outweigh the unproven assertion that PLAs drive up project costs," Barrett said.

Touring the site of the Bucks arena last week, Walker praised the "great progress" being done on the work there.

On Monday, Walker also signed Senate Bill 10, which would make it easier to acquire cannabinoid oil, or CBD oil.

The oil is made from marijuana and used to treat seizures in children. Under normal circumstances, the oil won't make users high because it's extremely low in the active substance known as THC.

The legislation passed the Assembly unanimously last month and cleared the Senate in February on a 31-1 vote, with just Sen. Duey Stroebel (R-Cedarburg) opposing it.

Supporters say the CBD legislation was written specifically to ease the fears of families nervous they could be arrested simply for possessing the oil to treat their children.

In 2014, legislators and Walker approved legislation — Lydia's Law — to allow families to obtain CBD oil in extremely limited cases to treat a patient. But the conditions have proved so restrictive that families and physicians have been unable to make use of it and the legislation's namesake, Lydia Schaeffer, died as a young girl before she could ever try the treatment.

The latest legislation would ease those limits, allowing families to possess CBD oil for any medical condition if approved by a physician on a yearly basis. A similar bill passed the Assembly last year but failed to get through the Senate.

"Today, we’re making it easier for people in our state to obtain CBD oil without a psychoactive effect to treat a medical condition as advised by their doctor," Walker said in a statement.

The passage of the CBD oil legislation comes as Democrats are promoting legislation to allow medical marijuana. That measure has not gained support among majority Republicans, however.