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Category: State news

Audit: UW System staffing, salaries increased as student population down 16K

The Center Square

The University of Wisconsin System has seen an increase of staff and salaries over the past 10 years while student enrollment has dropped by 16,000, according to an audit released by the chairs of the state audit committee.

Academic staff grew 33.4% with a 97.4% increase in salary costs over that time while limited appointees rose 39% with a 78.3% increase in salary costs.

Financial future of Universities of Wisconsin at stake in state budget negotiations

Wisconsin Public Radio

Advocates for higher education say it’s the wrong time for lawmakers to be considering a funding cut for Wisconsin’s university system.

Republicans in the state Assembly are floating the idea of slashing $87 million from the Universities of Wisconsin as part of the biennial budget. Last week, Assembly Speaker Robin Vos told reporters that he supports the cut, citing concerns about “too much political correctness” within the university system.

‘A sad blow to the Wisconsin Idea’: Hosts react to WPR cuts

The Cap Times

Emily Auerbach has co-hosted “University of the Air” for 30 years. She’s a UW-Madison English professor who directs the UW Odyssey Project, so she described her work on the show as “a labor of love.” Along with Norman Gilliland, she interviewed university faculty and other guests on a range of topics, such as the Salem witch trials, the Harlem Renaissance and dyslexia.

“It’s a way to take the brilliant minds that are at the university … and share that learning with a broader audience,” she said.

UW-Madison and UWM order budget cuts amid state and federal uncertainty

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

The University of Wisconsin-Madison and UW-Milwaukee are cutting costs over the next school year amid financial uncertainty at the federal and state level.

UW-Madison told schools and colleges to shave 5% of their 2026 budget. The administration and other units must trim 7%. Some exceptions may apply depending on a division’s financial circumstances.

UW-Madison announces cuts amid state budget and tariff uncertainties

WTMJ

Chancellor Jennifer Mnookin noted in a Monday message to UW–Madison faculty and staff that both the above issues factored into the base budget reductions of 5% that schools and colleges will be required to implement for next school year. Administrative and all other units that receive 101 funds will reduce their fund 101 base budgets by 7%.

UW–Madison faces 5% budget cuts amid federal funding uncertainty

WKOW - Channel 27

The University of Wisconsin-Madison is cutting its budget due to ongoing financial uncertainties stemming from changes to federal funding.

Schools and colleges will face a 5% base budget cut for fiscal year 2026, while administrative units will see a 7% reduction. These cuts are part of efforts to protect the university’s financial viability amid risks like potential federal funding changes and grant terminations.

Gov. Tony Evers says he won’t sign a state budget that doesn’t extend Child Care Counts payments

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

While the program was set to end in January 2024, Evers kept it afloat with emergency funding through June 2025.Evers has never vetoed the state budget in full, but he has threatened to do so in previous years over issues like funding cuts for the University of Wisconsin System.Evers said negotiations over  UW System funding levels this year are going in the “right direction” but didn’t reveal specifics, other than, “it’s a positive number.” Last week, Vos confirmed his caucus would support an $87 million cut.

Wisconsin’s 20 most influential Asian American Leaders for 2025, Part 1

Madison 365

Since finishing her residency at Loyola University Chicago / Cook County Hospital in 2015, she has been an attending physician with the US Department of Veterans Affairs in Salt Lake City and a clinical assistant professor at UW-Madison, practicing with UW Health.

Edgar Lin is Wisconsin State Policy Advocate & Counsel at Protect Democracy, where he focuses on policy advocacy and litigation related to preventing election subversion. He is a graduate of the University of Wisconsin–Madison Law School.

What the explosive growth of ‘blowout counties’ means for U.S. politics

NBC News

Some of the most important political coalitions for Democrats emerge on this map, especially in comparison with 2000. The 2024 map shows the birth of Democratic vote powerhouses in majority-Black DeKalb and Clayton counties in Georgia and in Wisconsin’s Dane County, home of Madison and the University of Wisconsin, with its heavily white and college degree-holding population. Both coalitions are essential to Democratic wins in those states in recent elections.

UWs need more state dollars to avoid closures, layoffs, leader says

The Cap Times

The leader of Wisconsin’s 13 public universities said without additional funding in the next state budget, he expects more branch campus closures, decreased affordability for students, layoffs and program cuts.

“All of which will hit hardest at our most vulnerable UWs,” Universities of Wisconsin President Jay Rothman said on social media this week.

Finance committee delays action due to budget disagreements, child care providers disappointed

Wisconsin Examiner

One in four Wisconsin child care providers could close their doors if the state support for centers ends in June, according to a survey of child care providers commissioned by the state Department of Children and Families (DCF) and produced by the Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Budget causes friction as Senate passes bills without funding attached

Wisconsin Examiner

Assembly Speaker Robin Vos said his caucus supports cutting $87 million from  the UW system, but wouldn’t say if that’s the final proposal the budget committee will take up. The system has said it needs additional funding and Evers had requested $855 million in his proposal for it. Vos says Republicans want “reform” of the UW for the “broken process that we currently have.”

Wisconsin legislators want tax cuts. How much would their plans save?

The Cap Times

“The income tax proposals cost the state a fair amount of money, but it’s not a huge share of the state budget,” said Ross Milton, an assistant professor of public affairs at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “The flip side of that is that the impacts to any given household in Wisconsin in terms of how much money they’ll save on income taxes are pretty modest.”

Report: Republicans weighing $87 million cut to UW system

Wisconsin State Journal

Republicans on the Legislature’s budget committee may deal the Universities of Wisconsin the system’s biggest cut in nearly a decade, to the tune of $87 million.

The cut was first reported by Civic Media on Monday night. By contrast, the UW system had requested an increase in state aid of $856 million. The committee had been slated to take up the UW system’s budget on Tuesday but punted it for unspecified reasons.

Wisconsin Republicans vote to add new prosecutors, but won’t replace expiring federal funds

Wisconsin Public Radio

GOP lawmakers also delayed a vote on the Universities of Wisconsin budget which had been scheduled for Tuesday. Evers’ budget called for about a $700 million increase in state funding for the UW system.

Democratic lawmakers told reporters Tuesday they’d heard Republicans were considering cutting funds to the UW system. The GOP cochairs of the budget committee did not comment when asked about that prospect.

Wisconsin Republicans back $1.3 billion tax cut plan that lowers bills for 1.6 million residents

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Evers said in a statement that he had agreed to support Republicans’ half of the deal including their top tax priorities, while Republicans could not reach consensus within their caucuses to back the governor’s proposals, including funding increases for K-12 education, child care and the University of Wisconsin System.

An Evers spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the June 12 vote.

Cracking down on fake emotional support, service animals among notable bills from May

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

This bill would require the University of Wisconsin System to contract with a vendor to provide virtual mental health services for students, beyond traditional business hours. Campuses have already utilized telehealth, lawmakers note.

“Telehealth services have proven to be effective in shortening waiting times to see a provider, and allow patients to receive care at their convenience,” bill authors wrote.

The Wisconsin Supreme Court will soon make final ruling on abortion. How did we get here?

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

The 1849 law has been on hold since a lower court’s ruling in December 2023. The state then returned to its pre-Dobbs abortion laws, under which abortion is banned 20 weeks after “probable fertilization.”

“We’re just waiting for a final answer on that,” said Bryna Godar, a staff attorney with the State Democracy Research Initiative at the University of Wisconsin Law School. “The current state of the law has been that abortions are legal, subject to other laws we have in the state.”

Wisconsin Supreme Court suspends Dane County judge over ‘intemperate’ behavior

Wisconsin Public Radio

Although the process for handling judicial misconduct varies by state, it is “somewhat rare” for judges to be suspended in Wisconsin and across the nation, said Bryna Godar, a staff attorney at the State Democracy Research Initiative at the University of Wisconsin Law School.

“[Nationwide] the overall judicial disciplinary process is sometimes critiqued from both sides as being overly lenient on judges or as being too harsh on judges,” Godar said. “It’s really difficult to strike this balance between accountability for judicial officers while wanting to preserve the independence of state courts and state judges.”

Lawmakers unveil bold plan to build game-changing energy device in unexpected location: ‘An incredible opportunity for the future’

The Cool Down

A group of researchers from the University of Wisconsin-Madison has been working with local Realta Fusion to make fusion energy a reality, but they’re not the only ones, according to a report by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

Three of the 45 companies working on fusion are already based in Wisconsin, and new bills supporting the advancement of this promising clean energy technology could draw even more to the area.

Wisconsin commemorates 50th anniversary of Hmong resettlement

Wisconsin Public Radio

Mai See Thao, a professor of anthropology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, told WPR’s “Wisconsin Today” that these resolutions are “long overdue.”

“Recognizing Hmong-Lao veterans is really important because they have never received the kinds of recognition that they’ve needed, given the fact that they supported the U.S. as proxy soldiers,” she said.

Packers, Bucks and some of Wisconsin’s biggest businesses wade into UW funding debate

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Nearly 800 business leaders and organizations have signed a letter urging state lawmakers to increase funding for the University of Wisconsin System.

The letter pulls a page from UW-Madison’s playbook. The university in 2023 gathered signatures from dozens of business leaders who supported an engineering building Republicans held up in the previous state budget and shared their support in a statewide campaign.

Federal cuts threaten Wisconsin farm safety center for children, rural communities

Wisconsin Public Radio

“Without the continued research that’s made possible with federal funding, it would set us back,” said John Shutske, an agricultural safety and health specialist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “We’ve seen over the last several decades a pretty dramatic decrease overall in our farm fatality rate. And while I think [the number of deaths] would probably plateau, I don’t think we would be able to continue to make the kind of progress that we’ve had.”

Stretch of dry weather is a welcome change for Northeast Wisconsin farmers

FOX 11, Green Bay

Kevin Jarek, regional crops and soils educator with UW-Madison’s Division of Extension for Outagamie & Winnebago counties, noted, “If I were to go to counties like Shawano and Waupaca, especially the western parts of those counties, they get much lighter in soil. It’s a sandy loam texture, whereas here as we get closer to Lake Michigan, we tend to have a lot of clay.”

Maternal health care in Wisconsin and the future of Medicaid

PBS Wisconsin

Dr. Ryan Spencer is an OB/GYN at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health. He says the state is in a maternal health care crisis, in part due to years without Medicaid expansion.

“I think we’re actually in the long-term impacts of having not addressed those for decades,” he said. “Any expansion to Medicaid is highly likely in any given area or state to improve access that women have to prenatal care, intrapartum care, and postpartum care.”

Tariffs could churn up trouble for Wisconsin’s dairy industry

The Badger Herald

Tariffs enacted under the Trump administration could have significant impacts on the agriculture industry in the U.S. and particularly on the dairy industry in Wisconsin, according to University of Wisconsin associate professor of agriculture and economics Chuck Nicholson.

“The tariffs have a number of different impacts, whether that be the tariffs we are placing on imports from other countries or the tariffs that other countries will place on us,” Nicholson said.