March 1, 2011
Overview of Walker’s Budget Proposal’s Program Cuts
A full copy of the budget proposal can be found here.
BadgerCare Medical Assistance:
Seek permission from the federal government to tighten eligibility standards. If the federal government does not give the state permission to toughen its standards for who gets Medicaid, the state would eliminate coverage to families that earn more than 133% of the federal poverty level. Overall, the efforts would mean an estimated $500 million in less spending on Medicaid.
Reduce what is covered under BadgerCare by creating “customized” benefit plans.
Restrict Family Care, which uses Medicaid funding to pay for in-home services for the elderly and those with disabilities, to current enrollees and begin a study of its cost-effectiveness. Milwaukee County already has a waiting list of about 2,000 people who want to get into the program, so this cut would further restrict access to in-home services.
Wisconsin Works (W-2) Income Support:
Cut the already meager monthly income support payment by $20. Under the proposed budget, the maximum amount of support a family could receive would be just $653 a month.
Reinstate a minimum weekly work requirement of 28 to 30 hours a week, limiting participants’ leeway to substitute vocational or college studies for a portion of the work requirement.
Wisconsin Shares Child Care Assistance:
Start a waiting list for Wisconsin Shares, the state’s subsidized child care program for low-income families. The budget would also increase co-payments for some families. These actions will decrease the availability of child care for low-income working parents and W-2 participants, making it more difficult for them to find and maintain employment.
Reduce state aid for K-12 education by $834, a 7.9% cut from the 2009-’11 budget. The bill simultaneously freezes property taxes for local governments and reduces by 5.5% the maximum amount per student that public school districts are able to receive in state aid and property taxes, limitations which prevent local governments from filling the gap from the loss of state aid with increases in property taxes.
End new enrollees in the Wisconsin Covenant Program, which gives the state’s best students additional financial aid, up to $2,500 based on need, to attend UW System schools.
Split UW-Madison from the UW System and cut $125 million in funding. Other state public universities would face 11% budget cuts, a total of $125 million. “Because a detached UW-Madison will be allowed to raise tuition as it sees fit, huge pressure will be placed on the abandoned fleet to remain ” UW-Oshkosh Chancellor David Wells said. “Significantly less state funding and ’affordable,’ tuition for the fleet means access with diminished quality for the 130,000 students – the 77% majority – who call, or will call, the fleet schools their educational homes.”
