>> thank you.

>> it's my honor to introduce the governor of the state of wisconsin, scott walker. >> thank you. thank you. thank you. thank you all. speaker fitzgerald, speaker pro tem cramer, president ellis, majority leader fitzgerald, minority leader miller, minority leader barca, members of the wisconsin supreme court,

constitutional officers, tribal leaders, members of the cabinet, distinguished guests, members of the legislature, my wife and our family, tonette walker and our family. and most importantly, fellow citizens of the great state of wisconsin. it is an honor to appear before you tonight. next to my wife is the agitent general of wisconsin, major general don dunbar.

i want to thank him and the more than 10,000 strong members of the wisconsin national guard. and tonight with him are the members of the 724th engineer battalion. stand up, gentlemen. [ applause ] >> i first spoke with them more than a year ago when they were deployed in iraq. i greeted them in the cold when they returned home, and i saw many of them again this summer, as they responded to the massive damage caused by storms in

northwestern, wisconsin. their dedication to their country, to the state and yes, to their communities is a prime example of what we all know as the spirit of wisconsin. we thank them and all of the other men and women in uniform who have served both past and present for their service. thank you, gentlemen. [ applause ] >> let us take a moment to honor a member of the state representative who's not here tonight. he's fighting a great battle. like so many of you, tonette and i spend our thoughts and prayers

to representative grimsby and her family. and we all look forward to seeing her in this chamber again soon. tonight, we come together to discus the state of our state. [ shouting ] most importantly where we are headed in the year to come. when i addressed you in this chamber last january, wisconsin had suffered through three years of 150,000 of our fellow citizens losing their jobs. the unemployment rate was 7.5%, and after years of tax increases and budget increase, wisconsin faced one of the largest budget deficits in the country.

[ shouting ] now our unemployment rate is down from a year ago. in fact, it's the lowest it's been since 2008. [ applause ] we're turning things around. we're headed in the right direction. during the past year, we added thousands of jobs. we balanced the state budget without raising taxes, without massive layoffs and without budget tricks. all of which allowed us to put more than $1.2 billion of new state money into medicaid programs like badger care and family care.

tonight, i want to share with you how we got here, and more importantly, i want to share our plan for helping the people of wisconsin create more jobs, keep a balanced budget and improve the education of our kids by working together. when i ran for governor, i talked a great deal about the core principles i call brown bag common sense. now, one of those principles is that people create job, not the government. [ applause ] in the past, however, some thought the government did create jobs and that's how he justified raising taxes to pay for the expansion of the government. i think that might explain prior to taking office, we lost some 150,000 private sector jobs. in contrast, i believe that it is the people of the state who create jobs and not the government.

with that in mind, i set out to improve the climate of small businesses in wisconsin. last year, we passed some of the most aggressive pro jobs legislation in the country and we did it with help from lawmakers in both political parties, because these aren't republican or democrat jobs. they're wisconsin jobs. [ applause ] tonight i'm happy to report after losing 150,000 jobs, wisconsin added new jobs in 2011. business formations are up by 2% and our unemployment rate is down from a year ago. in fact, wisconsin's unemployment rate is not only lower than the national average, it's actually much better to our neighbors in the south in illinois. [ applause ]

most importantly, we improved the climate for job creators here in wisconsin the last year. today, 94% of our job creators believe wisconsin is headed in the right direction. that compares to just 10% who thought the same thing two years ago. and a majority of those emplo r employers say they're going to grow in 2012. they'll join companiedlike u line or hudson, collaborative conning or shop go in green bay, city brewing in lacrosse, all of whom announced in uh jobs during the past year.

i was in superior just a few weeks ago when they announced they're adding 600 new jobs. [ applause ] this was a great team effort. and, in fact is the major said that day to us it was the largestjobs project in the region since world war ii. >> but the inspiring don't come from company owners or managers, they come from employees. sandy is one of those people who has one of those great stories. when the economy took a dive a

few years ago, she took a pay cut. not long after that, she lost her job. but today, however, she's working at g 3 industries. g3 is one of those companies that added jobs in the past year and now has plans to add even more in the future. now, the owner told me he's creating more jobs in wisconsin because he likes the way we're moving our state forward. that's important to remember, because without the positive changes, he told me he would not have had the confidence to grow his business here. you see, improving the business climate in this state is not only good for business owners, it's good for people like sandy and her family. >> we need more stories like sandy's in wisconsin. so the lieutenant governor and i

held small business round tables all over the state. from lacrosse to green bay, from milwaukee to awe claire, from madison to wasaw, we listened. we heard small business owners say they have jobs but they can't find enough skilled workers to fill them. this is a problem that must be solved. [ applause ] [ we doubled the amount of job fares, added staff to double people looking for employment, made it easier for job seekers to get the needed skills and did more to promote manufacturing. in addition, we are specifically targeting our veterans for full employment. it is unacceptable -- [ applause ]

i think you'll agree with me on this, it is unaccept to believe think that any man or woman that served our country would return home and not be able to have find a joob. i've made the full employment of our returning veterans a number one priority of the state department of veteran affairs. [ applause ] you see, focussing on veterans is good for employers like monarch company in milwaukee who's looking to add machinists and welders. they told me they understand the benefits of employing veterans. our returning service members are good mires because they're well disciplined. and on top of that, they can get their training paperwork through

the wisconsin g.i. bill that refully restored last year. to create more jobs, employers told us they also need help cutting through the red tape of government. tonight, i'm announcing new members to the regulatory review board, which has the authority to review every rule in all of our state agencies. i'll direct our agencies to work with them, to removant kwated and unnecessary regulations that pose a threat to creating new jobs. [ applause ]unnecessary regulat pose a threat to creating new jobs. [ applause ]and unnecessary regt pose a threat to creating new jobs. [ applause ] after the previous administration raided more than $1 billion out of the state transportation fund, i committed

to restore good road, freight rail and strong ports. we know that a strong transportation system helps manufacturers and farmers get product to and from market and it keeps good people on the job building that infrastructure. [ applause ] >> there is another tremendous opportunity for job growth in this state. we can pass legislation that will streamline the process for safe and environmentally sound mining. the proposed project could provide as many as at least 700 jobs at the mine and thousands across the state. now, i mentioned this idea several times during the campaign. and we've all debated this for months. now it is time for us to move forward on a project. it's not only about jobs, but also about the history of our badger state. [ applause ]

our heritage in wisconsin is also built on fiscal restraint. you see, one of the most important parts of our state tune affirms that frugality in government leads to freedom and prosperity for our people. that's worth repeating. frugality in government leads to freedom and prosperity for our people. [ applause ] i think our founders had it

right. think about it, when i spoke last january, we faced a $3.6 billion deficit. in the past, the state government took more than $1 billion away from building safe roads and bridges, illegally raided the fund to support malpractice victims and tax reciprocity. and on top of that, one-time federal stimulus money was used for ongoing costs. all these practices left us with a more than $3 billion hole to fill last year. while these poor decisions of the past left us with a major budget deficit, wisconsin was not alone. nearly every state in america faced a budget deficit in 2011. so what did other states do? well, some like illinois raised taxes. but that only made matters worse. other states used massive layoffs to balance their budgets. we avoided that in wisconsin. some states cut core servicings like medicaid, but in wisconsin, we added some $1.2 billion to medicaid