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Wisconsin Watch partners with Gigafact to produce Fact Briefs — bite-sized fact checks of trending claims. Read our methodology to learn how we check claims.

Yes.

Milwaukee County sales and property taxes have increased under County Executive David Crowley.

The Democratic nominee in the Nov. 3 election for governor takes credit for “the largest property tax cut” in the county’s history. 

That occurred after Act 12, a bipartisan state law, allowed local leaders to raise Milwaukee city and county sales taxes and provided local governments in Wisconsin more state aid. 

The law was largely aimed at helping the Milwaukee governments avert financial crises.

Crowley signed the near-doubling of the county sales tax, to 0.9% from 0.5%, after the Milwaukee County Board approved it.

Property tax levies have increased under Crowley, who took office in May 2020, though not as much as the state average (2.6% from 2020 to 2023):

2020: $304.8 million

2021: $310.3 million (1.8% increase)

2022: $313.8 million (1.1%)

2023: $292.3 million (-6.9%)

2024: $299.6 million (2.5%)

2025: $309.9 million (3.4%)

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Tom Kertscher joined Wisconsin Watch as a full-time Milwaukee-based reporter in October 2024 after starting as a freelance Fact Briefs reporter in January 2023. In addition to contributing to Wisconsin Watch’s collaboration with The Gigafact Project to combat online misinformation, he reports on Wisconsin policy, labor, energy and the rapid expansion of data centers across the state. Kertscher is a former longtime reporter at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, a contributing writer for Milwaukee Magazine and the author of two sports books, on Al McGuire and Brett Favre.