Gov. Scott Walker to unveil "big ideas" to reshape government

MADISON (WITI) -- Gov. Scott Walker will deliver his annual State of the State address to the people of Wisconsin on Tuesday, January 13th. This year, the governor plans to unveil what he calls "big ideas" to reshape state government.

Wisconsin's nearly $68 billion total budget faces a $2.2 billion shortfall, but Gov. Walker won't make that the focus of Tuesday night's speech. He'll detail his budget plan some three weeks later. Instead, the State of the State will outline Walker's vision for reorganizing the government -- which includes consolidating departments and cutting budgets.

"We'll be talking about a handful of other big ideas that aren't solely budgetary items, but maybe are in some way interwoven into the budget," said Gov. Walker.

Possible topics include Walker's ideas for a school accountability bill -- and what to do about the Common Core education standards. He may also touch on voucher expansion and workforce training programs.

New State Senate Minority Leader Jennifer Shilling says Walker's priorities are wrong -- and won't help the middle class.

"I think the first priority really needs to be job creation, we need to strengthen our economy and look  at workforce development.  Wisconsin lags our neighboring states in many of those benchmarks," said Shilling.

The chairman of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin held a conference call with reporters Monday -- and said the governor is more focused on running for president than he is on running Wisconsin. Gov. Walker says in order to be a viable presidential candidate, he has to do his job well here at home. Either way, this is one of the last major speeches before he makes his decision to get into the 2016 race.