{"id":8337,"date":"2024-01-16T23:29:50","date_gmt":"2024-01-17T00:29:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=8337"},"modified":"2024-01-17T00:59:39","modified_gmt":"2024-01-17T00:59:39","slug":"hundreds-of-millions-of-covid-dollars-still-unallocated-by-wisconsin-public-schools","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=8337","title":{"rendered":"Hundreds of Millions of COVID Dollars Still Unallocated by Wisconsin Public Schools"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This post originally appeared at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wisconsinrightnow.com\/wisconsin-public-schools-covid-money\/\">https:\/\/www.wisconsinrightnow.com\/wisconsin-public-schools-covid-money\/<\/a><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"2500\" height=\"1174\" src=\"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/word-image-100867-3.jpeg\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"Sheboygan Schools\" title=\"School Choice Wisconsin\" \/><\/p>\n<p>(The Center Square) \u2013 Public schools in Wisconsin have nine months left before the last of their COVID-19 relief cash expires, and there\u2019s hundreds of millions of dollars still on the table.<\/p>\n<p>The Institute for Reforming Government has been tracking Wisconsin\u2019s $1.5 billion in COVID relief money.<\/p>\n<p>Their latest update shows that $307 million of that haul remains unallocated.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBefore districts spend money, they are supposed to get DPI\u2019s approval. DPI confirms whether their allocations qualify for ESSER III reimbursement. So, districts either lack DPI approval for $307 million or are spending money without DPI approval with no guarantee of reimbursement,\u201d IRG said in its report. \u201cThirty-nine districts have below 50% allocated, including Green Bay and West Bend. Thirty-five districts have over $1 million left to allocate, including Milwaukee and Fond Du Lac. Eight districts are at $0 allocated.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>IRG first sounded the alarm about unallocated COVID cash in February. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thecentersquare.com\/wisconsin\/article_a3e9853e-a335-11ed-a611-f37483ba72b1.html\">At that point<\/a>, Wisconsin schools were sitting on about $1 billion of unallocated COVID money.<\/p>\n<p>IRG\u2019s report said the unallocated money is likely to add to the fiscal cliff that many schools across the state are facing.<\/p>\n<p>\u201c$512 million over 1.5 years has been allocated to district staff. <a href=\"https:\/\/journaltimes.com\/news\/local\/education\/racine-schools-facing-fiscal-cliff-starting-in-2024-25\/article_46fa9684-3b9b-11ee-a1cb-db166df703c5.html\">Various<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.greenbaypressgazette.com\/story\/news\/education\/2023\/09\/13\/how-the-green-bay-school-district-shrunk-its-budget-deficit-by-30m\/70828545007\">factors<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/captimes.com\/news\/education\/mmsd-board-takes-leap-of-faith-with-8-wage-increase\/article_b1c60ba5-b4d3-56de-a931-cadf56720d63.html\">contributed<\/a> to this problem, but Wisconsin schools could confront between 1% and 4% holes in the <a href=\"https:\/\/dpi.wi.gov\/sfs\/statistical\/cost-revenue\/section-d\">roughly $14 billion they spend<\/a> as a result. Schools\u2019 recent <a href=\"https:\/\/content.govdelivery.com\/accounts\/WIGOV\/bulletins\/3639e56\">2-year, $1.2 billion<\/a> increase in spendable authority may disappear more quickly than anticipated,\u201d the report noted.<\/p>\n<p>Making that cliff worse is how many schools are spending their COVID dollars.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cConstruction is the 2nd-largest allocation category at 24%. This $284 million could grow from inflation or supply chain delays, which is why the Biden administration \u2018<a href=\"https:\/\/oese.ed.gov\/files\/2022\/12\/ESSER-and-GEER-Use-of-Funds-FAQs-December-7-2022-Update.pdf\">strongly discouraged<\/a>\u2019 it,\u201d IRG stated.<\/p>\n<p>Unallocated doesn\u2019t mean unspent or wasted. IRG said it simply means school boards have not filed the formal paperwork and gotten the proper permission to spend their COVID dollars.<\/p>\n<p>Schools in Wisconsin have until September to make those allocations, even if the money will be spent next year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This post originally appeared at https:\/\/www.wisconsinrightnow.com\/wisconsin-public-schools-covid-money\/ (The Center Square) \u2013 Public schools in Wisconsin have&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":70,"featured_media":8339,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8337","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wi-right-now"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8337","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\/70"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8337"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8337\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8340,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8337\/revisions\/8340"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8339"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8337"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8337"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8337"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}