Increasing the maximum penalty for certain controlled substances offenses if the violation occurs near a homeless shelter and providing a penalty, the official text

2025 - 2026 LEGISLATURE
LRB-2967/1
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2025 SENATE BILL 610
November 6, 2025 - Introduced by Senators Hutton, Nass, Jacque, Wimberger and Tomczyk, cosponsored by Representatives Donovan, Behnke, Dittrich, Gundrum, Knodl, Kreibich, Kurtz, Maxey, Moses, Mursau, Penterman, Tittl and Wichgers. Referred to Committee on Judiciary and Public Safety.

An Act to amend 961.49 (2m); to create 961.49 (1m) (e) of the statutes; relating to: increasing the maximum penalty for certain controlled substances offenses if the violation occurs near a homeless shelter and providing a penalty.

Analysis by the Legislative Reference Bureau
Current law prohibits a person from delivering or distributing, or possessing with the intent to deliver or distribute, cocaine, cocaine base, fentanyl, a fentanyl analog, heroin, phencyclidine, lysergic acid diethylamide, psilocin, psilocybin, amphetamine, methamphetamine, methcathinone, or any form of tetrahydrocannabinols. The penalty for violating the prohibition varies by substance and amount, but current law increases the maximum term of imprisonment for violating the prohibition by five years if the violation takes place on or in, or within 1,000 feet of, a park, a jail, a multiunit public housing project, a public swimming pool, a youth or community center, a school or a school bus, or the premises of a treatment facility that provides alcohol and other drug abuse treatment. This bill adds that the maximum term of imprisonment may be increased by five years if the violation takes place on the premises of a homeless shelter or within 1,000 feet of the premises of a homeless shelter.
Because this bill creates a new crime or revises a penalty for an existing crime, the Joint Review Committee on Criminal Penalties may be requested to prepare a report.

The people of the state of Wisconsin, represented in senate and assembly, do enact as follows:

Section 1. 961.49 (1m) (e) of the statutes is created to read:
961.49 (1m) (e) While the person is in a homeless shelter or while the person is on or within 1,000 feet of the premises of a homeless shelter if either the person knows or should have known that he or she is on or within 1,000 feet of the premises of a homeless shelter or the homeless shelter is readily recognizable as a homeless shelter.
Section 2. 961.49 (2m) of the statutes is amended to read:
961.49 (2m) If any person violates s. 961.65 and, during the violation, the person intends to deliver or distribute methamphetamine or a controlled substance analog of methamphetamine under any of the circumstances listed under sub. (1m) (a), (b), (c), or (d), or (e), the maximum term of imprisonment for that crime is increased by 5 years.
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