As Gov. Tony Evers prepares to introduce his next biennial budget proposal, his administration can’t say how they have allocated a significant portion of the federal COVID aid Evers has nearly complete control over.
And as the governor calls for billions more in education spending, a new report shows there’s a massive amount of federal education aid the state has yet to approve for spending.
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Last week, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen blamed the American people for the 40-year high inflation we have been enduring.
Appearing on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert,” she said that Americans “were in their homes for a year or more, they wanted to buy grills and office furniture, they were working from home, they suddenly started splurging on goods, buying technology.” According to her, this consumer “splurging” caused prices to rise so much.
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If it weren’t for federal dollars, Milwaukee’s bad 2023 budget would be much worse.
A new report from the Wisconsin Policy Forum makes the case that Milwaukee is simply postponing an inevitable fiscal crisis for another year or so with Mayor Cavalier Johnson’s latest spending proposal.
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As Democrats head into the November midterms with historically low approval ratings, another major factor could arise that will further contribute to the shrinking of their already-slim majorities.
As reported by The Hill, the Affordable Care Act – known colloquially as “Obamacare” – could face a significant increase in premiums due to a lapse in special funding provided by the coronavirus aid bill passed last year. That bill, known as the American Rescue Plan, temporarily increased financial assistance for Americans seeking healthcare through Obamacare; the increase was set to expire just one year after the bill’s passage.
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Last week, President Biden gave a speech listing everyone and everything allegedly responsible for record high inflation. His list included corporate greed and price gouging, Vladimir Putin, and “ultra-MAGA” Republicans. The president said that his policies, and the nearly $7 trillion in spending he authorized, have nothing to do with inflation.
None of this holds up under scrutiny. While President Biden claims that corporations are ripping off Americans, the costs of their supplies have been increasing at a record rate. In reality, many companies that Biden claims are stiffing consumers have actually lost money because they don’t want to alienate their customers by raising prices too quickly.
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Over one year after the United States Congress passed the “American Rescue Plan,” the vast majority of school districts that were awarded relief funds have spent less than ten percent of that money.
According to the Washington Free Beacon, approximately $122 billion of the overall $1.9 trillion bill was designated for school districts that were determined to be in distress and in need of relief funds. But of that $122 billion, only about 7 percent has been spent in total across all the school districts nationwide that received some handouts.
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An inspector general’s report reveals that the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) handed out as much as $64 million in stimulus funding to dead people after Joe Biden signed the American Rescue Plan into law.
Just The News reports that the massive oversight was due to a computer error that the IRS was aware of but did not fix at the time. Ultimately, nearly 45,000 total payments were sent to Americans with deceased dependents who died before January 1st, 2021.
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Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers on Wednesday approved $10 million in funding for infrastructure improvements at ports and harbors across the state.
In collaboration with the Wisconsin Department of Transportation (WisDOT) and Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection (DATCP), the money seeks to encourage economic development.
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Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers opted to remove the consideration of race from a mortgage-assistance program after the Wisconsin Institute of Law and Liberty (WILL) highlighted several constitutional concerns.
The group pointed out that Evers intended to expand eligibility for “socially disadvantaged” groups, defining those as “any racial or ethnic group besides non-Hispanic/Latinx White.”
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Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers on Wednesday dished out $20 million in “healthcare infrastructure” grants.
The funds will be used to upgrade and improve portions of the Marshfield Medical Center-Park Falls, according to a release from the governor’s office.
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Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers on Thursday announced a new grant for Milwaukee and Milwaukee County that will award approximately $25 million to the region.
The money, which was awarded to the state through the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), will go to affordable housing and other issues in the region. For example, child care services and libraries will see a boost in funding.
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President Joe Biden’s administration plans to provide millions of COVID-19 tests to K-12 schools each month, the White House said in a Wednesday statement.
This month, the Biden administration will start shipping five million rapid COVID-19 tests each month to K-12 schools across the country in an effort to keep schools open amid a spike in COVID-19 cases and the rise of the Omicron coronavirus variant, according to White House officials. The new tests will allow schools to double the “volume of testing” from November 2021.
The administration also plans to expand lab capacity to provide an additional five million tests per month so schools can “perform individual and pooled testing in classrooms nationwide.”
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The state of Iowa on Friday sued the city of Sioux City regarding discharge of wastewater.
In the lawsuit, the state asks the Iowa District Court for Woodbury County to make the city pay up to $5,000 per day of violations of state wastewater treatment regulations (Iowa Code section 455B.186(1), 567 Iowa Admin. Code 64.3(1)) and the city’s National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit. It seeks a permanent injunction preventing Sioux City from further violations of these state laws and the treatment permit requirements.
The state said that for periods between March 15, 2012, and June 8, 2015, Sioux City’s treatment facility would only properly disinfect water discharges on days it collected and submitted samples for E. coli contamination to the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, the lawsuit said.
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Low-income tenants across the country are behind on rent payments because of the pandemic, even as billions of dollars appropriated by Congress to assist renters remain untouched.
About $5.2 billion of the $46.6 billion — roughly 11% — set aside for the Emergency Rental Assistance (ERA) program has been distributed to low-income tenants, according to the most recent data released by the Department of the Treasury on Wednesday. House Financial Services Committee Ranking Member Patrick McHenry characterized the Biden administration’s handling of the ERA program as “gross mismanagement.”
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The number of Americans filing new unemployment claims increased to 353,000 last week as the economy continues its recovery from the coronavirus pandemic.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics figure released Thursday presents a slight increase in the number of new jobless claims compared to the week ending Aug. 14, when 349,000 new jobless claims were reported. The Aug. 7 to Aug. 14 figure was revised from the 348,000 jobless claims initially reported last week.
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