(The Center Square) – A name, image and likeness bill related to the University of Wisconsin athletics would send $14.6 million in general purpose taxpayer funds to UW-Madison annually for maintenance and debt service on athletics facilities instead of requiring the UW system to pay for 40% of the principal and interest costs.
The payment is part of a bill that also requires athletes to disclose to the school any third-party NIL deals, places restrictions on the content of those deals and also would make those deals exempt from public records.
UW-Madison athletics operated with a $4.3 million surplus in its most recent annual NCAA financial report released last month covering the financial year that ended in June 2025.
Athletic department officials told the Assembly Committee on State Affairs on Wednesday that football is responsible for 80% of the athletic department’s revenue. That was $113.6 million last fiscal year, according to the NCAA report, which showed the football program brought in $72 million in excess during the year.
UW-Madison Vice Chancellor for Legal Affairs Nancy Lynch told the committee that the university currently uses the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act as reasoning to claim those deals are not public records but Assembly Bill 1034 would provide legislative framework to deny those records requests.
“Without it, it creates uncertainty in many areas for us,” Lynch said.
Lynch, UW-Madison Athletics Director Chris McIntosh and volleyball coach Kelly Sheffield all testified in front of the committee, saying that the bill was important for UW-Madison to remain competitive in the new NIL athletic landscape with its 23 sports and 600-plus athletes.
“There is a significant threat to our Olympic sports, our women’s sports,” McIntosh said.
Athletic department officials and bill sponsors such as Rep. Alex Dallman, R-Markesan, cited a 2022 marketing report from Philadelphia-based Consult Solutions that claimed each UW-Madison football game brings $19 million of economic impact to Dane County.
Those types of hired marketing reports, however, are consistently rejected by sports economists who point out the flaws in the math used and how they do not factor in items such as diverted spending, crowding out effects and the costs related to large events and facilities.
Sports teams and athletic programs then use those marketing reports to justify public spending, the UW-Madison athletics officials are doing with AB 1034, which does not have a fiscal estimate attached yet.
Dallman said that 32 states currently have NIL state laws in place, including Ohio, Texas, Connecticut and West Virginia.
The NIL bill, co-sponsored by Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu, was introduced Tuesday and received both a public hearing and approval from the Assembly Committee on State Affairs on Wednesday.
The bill would also send $200,000 annually in state funds to UW-Milwaukee for debt service on maintenance costs of the UW–Milwaukee Klotsche Center and $200,000 annually for the UW–Green Bay soccer complex.
