MADISON, Wis. — During his State of the State address last month, Gov. Tony Evers declared 2025 the ‘Year of the Kid’ across Wisconsin, which put a lot of focus on child care.

Now, as the governor gets ready to unveil his budget priorities in the coming weeks, parents and daycares are pushing even harder for spending on a crisis they hope doesn’t get worse.

Earlier this week, lawmakers, child care providers and families gathered at the Capitol to show their support for continued investments in child care and the crucial role it plays across the state. Those stakeholders said public education and programs are already under-funded, so if something doesn’t change soon, taxpayers could be faced with more burdens unless lawmakers tap into the state’s nearly $4 billion surplus.

What You Need To Know

  • This week, lawmakers, child care providers and families gathered at the Capitol to show their support for continued investments in child care and the crucial role it plays across the state

  • Parents also voiced concerns about Head Start programs dealing with funding delays and the future uncertainty about federal funding
  • Last month, Gov. Evers announced his budget will propose funding to make the state’s Child Care Counts program permanent, including more than $500 million aimed at lowering child care costs and investing in employer-sponsored child care

Democrats have especially argued that Wisconsin is already in a state of crisis when it comes to child care. Even before federal funds were recently put into limbo, which for the time being, is making things worse.

“I was up all night. I think it’s kind of a real big shock to know in a few weeks if this doesn’t get corrected that my children won’t have child care, and I will potentially lose my job,” Chelsea Fields, a single mother from Madison, explained. “I am my only income for my household.”

Fields has sent her soon-to-be 3-year-old and 2-year-old to The Playing Field on Madison’s westside for about a year now. However, with Head Start programs dealing with funding delays, providers are doing their best to make sure parents like her don’t lose care.

“Close to 90% of our income actually goes directly toward staff salary and benefits, so our overhead is very low, and we do that intentionally so that we can maintain really professional teachers,” Founder and Executive Director of The Playing Field Abbi Kruse said. “I think the impact on families is just this uncertainty of not knowing are they going to have child care.”

Even though President Donald Trump’s executive order to freeze federal grants was rescinded, a technical glitch has left providers with more questions than answers as they run out of options to keep things afloat for the time being.

“They are not drawing down like a big chunk of money in advance. They draw down like you and I would use a bank for our mortgage,” Jennie Mauer, who serves as executive director of the Wisconsin Head Start Association, explained. “We draw down, we pay out, so they are not drawing down in advance. The money comes in, it has to go right back out, and so this situation is really just perilous. They don’t have like a huge trough of reserves.”

Many parents, including Fields, don’t have huge reserves of their own either.

“The inflation and resources getting cut, if we don’t all unite and speak up about this, then it’s going to affect all of us as a community and I feel like it’s going to set us all back,” Fields added.

Last month, Gov. Evers announced his budget will propose funding to make the state’s Child Care Counts program permanent. That includes more than $500 million aimed at lowering child care costs and investing in employer-sponsored child care.

Related Stories