Wisconsin Joint Finance Committee Discusses Funding for Department of Children and Families
Wednesday, June 5th, 2019 -- 7:43 AM
(WRN) -The state's Joint Finance Committee discussed funding for the Department of Children and Families last night.Before getting to health care funding at Joint Finance committee last night, Democrats and Republicans debated the amount of funding going to the Department of Children and Families. Democrat assemblyman Evan Goyke says the state should be treating childcare funding as an investment for the future.
"When we invest in young people, those early investments pay off over the long run. If we start young people off right, they will be more productive over the course of their entire life."
Republican assemblywoman Amy Loudenbeck says G-O-P leadership shares the same concerns that Democrats do when it comes to childhood development.
"We talked about this in our pre-meeting and we heard this all across the state where we have a child welfare system that is overwhelmed."
Democrat Senator LaTonya Johnson says one vital part of the Governor's budget was increasing the funding for counties to run the foster system.
"If we can fix our foster care system, we can fix our juvenile justice system. If we can fix our juvenile justice system we can fix our incarceration rates."
Republicans approved a measure that raises spending by 125-million dollars over the next two years, which is 65 million dollars less than Governor Evers was asking for.
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