For children to grow up healthy and strong, we must provide them with proper nourishment: healthy meals, a doctor to visit when they’re sick, a quality child care center, strong schools, a safe home, and a just community. But not every child in Wisconsin is getting the nourishment they need, far too many kids are living in poverty. In...
Republican legislators voted today to revise or reject significant aspects of the Governor’s proposals to change community-based long-term care for the elderly and people with disabilities. However, they left enough of the Governor’s ideas intact to alarm advocates and people who rely on the Family Care and IRIS programs. A guiding...
The Affordable Care Act (ACA) provides funding for states to expand health insurance coverage for low-income adults who have income below 138% of the federal poverty level (FPL). That part of the ACA gave Wisconsin a great opportunity to close a very large gap in BadgerCare – coverage for “childless adults” (adults who aren’t custodial parents of a dependent child).
May 17-24 is the National Week of Action Against Incarcerating Youth. The effort, led by the Save Our Kids organization is posting a range of resources that can help inform everyone about how many youth are placed out of home in both secure and non-secure confinement settings. You can see how Wisconsin compares with other states by...
Wisconsin Shares The Joint Finance Committee at its May 14 meeting agreed to an adjusted Wisconsin Shares direct child care subsidy budget that is $11.9 million less than the Governor’s proposal for the 2015-17 biennial budget. Compared with the last year’s subsidy budget, the Joint Finance adjustment will result in a cut of $12.6...
Once again, on May 13, a House appropriations committee has essentially "zeroed out" Title II funding for juvenile justice - those really are the only remaining funds allocated through the federal government to the states to support innovative programming as well as help monitor and enforce the core protections of the Juvenile Justice...
With the release of its latest KIDS COUNT® report titled Every Kid Needs a Family: Giving Children in the Child Welfare System the Best Chance for Success, the Casey Foundation calls attention to what almost everyone knows instinctively and most of us take for granted, that children grow best when supported by strong and supportive...
Better get ready for a battle if you value federal support for poor and low-income families and their children. According to a recent article by the Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP), House and Senate Budget Makes Wrong Choices, large cuts to important progress are proposed: “While programs for low- and moderate-income people...
Wisconsin is 6th in the nation in four-year-old access to state-funded preschool education, according to the annual state Pre-K report for 2014, released by the National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER). The survey found that 49,687 four-year-olds were enrolled...
If you have followed the travails of the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act (JJDPA) you know that I have written about the “twists and turns” that have resulted from concerns about compliance monitoring, with Wisconsin being the “highlight” (or perhaps lowlight) of the discussion. My comments really focused on making sure...
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