Two Wisconsin communities, Waukesha and the Greater Green Bay Area were honored last week as being among the best communities in the U.S. for young people in 2010. The “100 Best Communities for Young People” is a list prepared annually by America’s Promise Alliance and ING for extraordinary community-wide efforts to improve the...
Will Congress Act This Week to Save Thousands of Jobs?
If you get the Sunday New York Times or read it online, you may have seen this September 26 headline: “Job Loss Looms as Part of Stimulus Act Expires.” The article concerns a portion of the Recovery Act funding that has been used to help low income families in a variety of ways, including providing funding to initiate or expand...
Historic Health Care Reforms Start Today
A number of very significant health insurance protections for families and children take effect today, on the six-month anniversary of the health care reform act. That law, known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), includes the following reforms, which will curb some of the worst excesses of the insurance...
New Census Data Confirm that Wisconsin Continues to Be a Leader in Providing Access to Health Insurance
Poverty and income figures for 2009 that were released yesterday by the U.S. Census Bureau provide additional evidence of the economic pain that the Great Recession has inflicted on families across the nation. In some respects, such as median household income, that toll has been even heavier in Wisconsin, yet Wisconsin continues to be a...
Consolidating Ethan Allen and Lincoln Hills Included in the 2011-13 DOC Budget
For those following the issue of whether the two male juvenile facilities can be consolidated, there is a pretty clear statement in the Department of Corrections budget submission anticipating that consolidation will occur during the next biennium. The proposal includes an increase in the daily rate charged to counties for JCI...
Almost Everyone Gets an Extension to Implement the Adam Walsh/SORNA Requirements
As of now, 237 jurisdictions have requested and received extensions to implement regulations that comply with the requirement of the Adam Walsh Act or the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA). Extensions have been granted through July, 2011, and as of now only three states (Delaware, Florida, and Ohio) have...
Finding Opportunities for Juvenile Justice Reform During Difficult Fiscal Times
The National Juvenile Justice Network is presenting a webinar titled “Finding Opportunities for Reform During Difficult Fiscal Times” on Thursday, September 23 at 12:30 p.m. CDT. The webinar is based on the recent publication The Real Costs and Benefits of Change: Finding Opportunities for Reform During Difficult Fiscal Times and covers...
New Poverty Numbers from the Census Bureau
Today the U.S. Census Bureau updated its Current Population Survey (CPS) dataset with new information on poverty, income, and health insurance. As was widely expected, there’s been a large jump in the number of Americans living in poverty. The Wisconsin Council on Children and Families has done some rapid-response number crunching since...
Wisconsin Budget Project Releases New Analysis of Government Employment Levels
Wisconsin continues its decade-long trend of having fewer state and local employees than the national average, according to a new analysis by the Wisconsin Budget Project. Recently released data from the U.S. Census Bureau show that Wisconsin has 4.4 percent fewer state and local government employees per capita in 2009 than the national...
Senate Vote Tuesday on First Effort to Undermine Health Care Reform
The federal health care reform law contains a variety of different measures to raise funding to offset the costs of expanding access to health care. One of those measures, which is now under attack, is expected to increase tax revenue by $17.1 billion over the next ten years by improving the ability of the IRS to keep track of business...
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