It is common practice in Wisconsin and around the country that youth who are in secure custody come into their court hearings in shackles of one kind or another. Almost always this is because that is how adult inmates are transported and attend hearings. Security and safety reasons are most often cited by the agencies responsible for...
By Qualifying for Increased Federal Medicaid Fund, Wisconsin Could Avoid Many Budget Cuts Two Legislative Fiscal Bureau (LFB) papers released yesterday show that expanding BadgerCare could go a long way to helping avoid or scale back some of the deep cuts in the state budget bill. One of those memos, which was prepared for Senator Jon...
More evidence that the obesity epidemic is preventable and that we need to start early. The National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER) has a recent blog on this topic. Healthy preschool habits can last a lifetime It includes links to resources, a policy brief, and various studies. One item caught my eye, "Early care and...
The YoungStar Consortium (Celebrate Children Foundation, Supporting Families Together Association, and Wisconsin Early Childhood Association) produced a report last year that we have neglected to blog about. Here is a link to the full report: Moving Wisconsin Forward Lots of good info in this document. There is a timeline of progress...
At long last we can begin to see how the Governor is proposing to close the substantial deficit facing the state, including the changes in the budget for the Department of Health Services (DHS). It will take much more careful study of the various budget documents before the changes come into clearer focus, but here are a few initial...
Happy Groundhog Day! Unfortunately, just like Bill Murray's day in the movie, things seem to be repeating themselves. Child care workers continue to be at the bottom of the wage scale of the civilian workforce, earning barely more than fast food cooks, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. A Child Trends Report provides...
The New Yorker magazine had a lengthy piece a few weeks ago on a novel experiment in Providence, RI. It was titled The Talking Cure: The poorer parents are, the less they talk with their children. The mayor of Providence is trying to close the “word gap.” It is well worth the read. The program is based on extensive research and is...
President Obama proposed greatly expanded child care tax credits in his State of the Union address January 20, 2015. Right after the address, NBC analyst Chuck Todd predicted that the child care tax credit proposal is one of three proposals by the President most likely to pass in Congress. Wow, maybe this has a chance! Here are the...
Federal officials recently released the 2015 Federal Poverty Income Guidelines, better known as the federal poverty levels (FPL). States and the federal government use the guidelines to determine eligibility for many public assistance programs, such as Medicaid, BadgerCare and child care subsidies. The following three tables show how...
President Obama last month announced his plan to invest $4 billion in expanding early education for children. In the meantime Zero to Three -- a national advocacy organization and member of the newly launched Invest in Us campaign -- rallied its own team around the need to ensure babies are a substantive part of that equation. "There...
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