End of Pandemic-Era Childcare Funding Could Result in the Closure of Wisconsin Childcare Providers

Wednesday, June 3rd, 2026 -- 10:01 AM

(Joe Schulz, Wisconsin Public Radio) The expiration of pandemic-era childcare funding at the end of the month could force about one-quarter of Wisconsin providers to either close or significantly reduce services, according to a new report.

According to Joe Schulz with Wisconsin Public Radio, the nonprofit Wisconsin Early Childhood Association’s report looked at how those funds have helped keep providers afloat and what the loss could mean.

Federal childcare stabilization funding “prevented system collapse” during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the report states. Those dollars were distributed to providers through the state’s Child Care Counts program.

The state launched the Child Care Bridge Payments program in 2025 to provide roughly $110 million to providers through June 2026 to help with the wind-down of Child Care Counts.

The bridge payments were funded through interest earned on federal pandemic funding, according to the Wisconsin Early Childhood Association. And the payments providers received under that program were smaller than they received under Child Care Counts, which had already been cut in half in 2023.

Stabilization funding has helped reverse a decade-long decline in licensed early childhood education programs and allowed providers to grow and retain staff without raising tuition costs for parents, according to the report.

Providers saw the strongest workforce growth “when funding levels were highest and slower growth as funding was reduced,” the report reads. There’s been no state legislation passed to make that funding permanent and the program is scheduled to end on June 30, said Ruth Schmidt, executive director of the Wisconsin Early Childhood Association.

“It literally would take another act of our Legislature to essentially recreate the system through which these direct payments could continue to be used,” she said. “That entire system basically gets shut down once those final June payments are made.”

Without continued public investment, the state is at risk of creating a childcare landscape where access is “increasingly limited to the wealthiest families, undermining workforce participation, economic stability, and long term outcomes for children,” according to the report.

Nearly three-quarters of providers expect to raise tuition, which could cost families between $1,300 and $2,600 per year, the report states. The report also says 1 in 4 providers reported being “somewhat, very or extremely likely to close their program if stabilization payments end.”

Paula Drew, director of early childhood education policy and research for the Wisconsin Early Childhood Association, said many providers were already forced to raise tuition due to rising costs and prior funding cuts.

She said the report may “end up underestimating the impacts” due to “where the economy is at right now” with high fuel prices and rising costs. “Providers have already been saying, ‘Parents are indicating they can no longer afford to send their kids here. But if we don’t raise tuition, we won’t be able to keep our doors open,’” Drew said.

“Until permanent funding for the public good that childcare provides comes to Wisconsin, childcare will start to be a luxury item for people that can actually afford it.” Heather Murray, the owner and operator of Arthouse Preschool in Waunakee, said she’s been forced to raise tuition by about 16 percent since 2022, and she plans to raise it another 3 percent in June when the payments run out.

She said tuition increases have primarily gone toward ensuring that she can “keep the doors open” in the face of rising costs. The last time she raised tuition, Murray said two families chose to stop sending their children to Arthouse, with the mothers in both cases opting to leave the workforce.

She said she’s worried the industry is “pricing out” middle class families. “Childcare is a public good. It really cannot function on parents’ tuition alone,” Murray said. “We’ve been saying that for years. Hopefully, we’re getting to the point where people will listen.”

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