{"id":5362,"date":"2023-09-03T05:03:33","date_gmt":"2023-09-03T05:03:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=5362"},"modified":"2023-09-03T19:59:58","modified_gmt":"2023-09-03T19:59:58","slug":"wisconsin-economic-development-under-fire-after-latest-audit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=5362","title":{"rendered":"Wisconsin Economic Development Under Fire After Latest Audit"},"content":{"rendered":"

This post originally appeared at https:\/\/wisconsindailystar.com\/news\/wisconsin-economic-development-under-fire-after-latest-audit\/tcsquare\/2023\/09\/03\/<\/a><\/p>\n

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by Benjamin Yount<\/h5>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

There are new calls to overhaul Wisconsin\u2019s economic development arm after another audit found more problems.<\/p>\n

The Legislative Audit Bureau report into the Wisconsin Economic Development Corp. found WEDC missed its promised-jobs-mark, spent thousands of dollars on ineligible grants and failed to recoup money that should have been paid back.<\/p>\n

\u201cEver since its inception, I\u2019ve been keeping a close eye on WEDC, given the opportunity for mismanagement and fraud that their broad mandate presents. While it was a bit rocky in their early years, I had recently felt that WEDC may be moving in the right direction. I\u2019m disappointed to say I don\u2019t feel that way anymore,\u201d Sen. Rob Cowles, R-Green Bay, said of the audit.<\/p>\n

Auditors said WEDC spent nearly $1 billion on tax credit grants and loans between 2011 and 2021, with the promise of creating 26,241 jobs during that decade.\u00a0The audit<\/a>\u00a0says businesses that received those tax credits and loans created 17,485 jobs.<\/p>\n

\u201cWEDC\u2019s information indicated that recipients of 338 tax credit and loan awards that closed through FY 2021-22 created 66.9% of the planned number of jobs,\u201d the report noted.<\/p>\n

WEDC said those same companies retained just 73.7% of the jobs they were contractually obligated to keep.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis administration needs to take a hard look at the management of WEDC and ensure that swift changes per LAB\u2019s recommendations are implemented. Ensuring statutory compliance, fiscal prudence and transparency should be values at the forefront of WEDC\u2019s mission,\u201d Cowles added.<\/p>\n

In addition to missing the jobs-mark, the audit says WEDC\u2019s \u201cprocedures for awarding tax credits did not consistently comply with statutes.\u201d<\/p>\n

That includes five grants worth a total of $50,000 that were made to ineligible recipients, as well as eight grant recipients who were not required to repay more than $64,000 that had been used to cover expenditures outside the contractually specified time periods or not verified.<\/p>\n

Auditors say WEDC also didn\u2019t revoke $2.6 million in tax credits, even though these recipients did not meet their contractual obligations.<\/p>\n

WEDC Secretary MIssy Hughes acknowledged the audit and promised some changes.<\/p>\n

\u201cLAB has emphasized the importance of evaluating WEDC\u2019s programs and impacts. WEDC agrees and recognizes that evaluation of programs is critical to determining the best means of deploying its resources. To this end, WEDC is improving internal program evaluation processes and plans to engage a third party to evaluate the Business Development Tax Credit Program,\u201d Hughes told the auditors.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis evaluation shows that WEDC\u2019s leadership is not displaying these values to the hardworking business owners and consumers of Wisconsin,\u201d Cowles said.<\/p>\n

\u2013 \u2013 \u2013<\/p>\n

Benjamin Yount is a contributor to The Center Square.\u00a0<\/a>
\n<\/em>Photo \u201cWisconsin State Capitol\u201d by Lectrician2<\/a>. CC BY-SA 4.0.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

The post Wisconsin Economic Development Under Fire After Latest Audit<\/a> appeared first on The Wisconsin Daily Star<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This post originally appeared at https:\/\/wisconsindailystar.com\/news\/wisconsin-economic-development-under-fire-after-latest-audit\/tcsquare\/2023\/09\/03\/ by Benjamin Yount \u00a0 There are new calls to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":3495,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5362","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wi-daily-star"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5362","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5362"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5362\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5363,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5362\/revisions\/5363"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3495"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5362"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5362"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5362"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}