I don’t recall hearing the Governor talk about child poverty in his speech tonight. I suppose that’s not surprising because the growth in that poverty rate wouldn’t have fit well in the narrative of success that the Governor was attempting to convey. He argued that positive economic indicators justify more of the tax cutting and austerity measures included in his first budget. In WCCF’s press release this evening, Ken Taylor questioned that perspective:

“Governor Walker spoke repeatedly of the great progress Wisconsin has made during his tenure thanks to his first state budget. We see a different picture. We see a state that ranks 42nd nationally in job creation, and whose child poverty rate is growing at double the national average. We can do better, but not by doubling down on the imbalanced policies of the last two years.”

That release addresses a number of our initial concerns about the budget bill. I’d like to highlight one that didn’t make it into the release, but strikes me as a particularly disappointing example of doubling down on the policies in the last budget that were harmful for poor families – raiding the TANF block grant funding.As I explained on several occasions in 2011, the last budget and budget repair bills took a total of $111 million of funding from the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) block grant and supplanted state funding for Wisconsin’s Earned Income Tax Credit. In fact, even as the biennial budget used TANF dollars to fund a larger share of the EITC, it was substantially cutting the credits.

To my surprise, we learned tonight that the Governor’s 2013-15 budget would compound the problem by raising the amount transferred by $27 million per year.  Secretary Anderson’s budget request sought to reduce the transfer of TANF funds, but the proposed bill does just the opposite.

This kind of shell game would be far less surprising during a time of severe fiscal distress. However, the state is finishing the current biennium with a $485 million budget balance. This is not the time to cut deeper into funding for things like child care, W-2 and K-12 education in order to increase the size of an income tax cut that will disproportionately help high income state residents.

In future posts we’ll look at some of the ramifications of the choice to cut the amount of TANF funds available for programs needed to serve a growing population of children living in poverty.

Jon Peacock