Protesters Rally at the State Capitol for the Child Care Subsidy Program

Thursday, June 22nd, 2023 -- 11:01 AM

(By Sarah Lehr, Wisconsin Public Radio) Pint-size protesters could be seen outside Wisconsin’s Capitol Tuesday, holding signs and making speeches as a group of more than 100 children, parents, workers and business owners called for the continuation of a child care subsidy program. 

According to Sarah Lehr with Wisconsin Public Radio, Wisconsin’s allocated hundreds of millions of dollars through the pandemic-era Child Care Counts program, which was intended to keep the child care industry afloat.

Thousands of Wisconsin child care centers used the federal grants to partially offset expenses for things like wages, rent, utilities, and personal protective equipment. But, with federal funding set to run out by early 2024, Democratic Gov. Tony Evers asked for more than $340 million over the next two years to keep the Child Care Counts program going.

Last week, the Republican-led Joint Committee of Finance rejected that request, and declined to allocate any state dollars for Child Care Counts in the next biennial budget.

About 27 percent of Wisconsin child care directors reported they would have closed without the Child Care Counts grants, according to a fall 2022 workforce survey by National Association for the Education of Young Children.

Once those grants end, over 60 percent of those surveyed predicted they would need to raise tuition. And more than a third of the respondents said they’ll be forced to cut pay.

The child care industry was "already fragile" and the pandemic only intensified those financial pressures, a University of Wisconsin-Madison study of the Child Care Counts program notes.

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