Legislators fume as problems mount in Wisconsin Shares’ child care program

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Legislators fumed Wednesday as problems continued to mount in the Wisconsin Shares tax-funded child care program for the working poor.

An ongoing audit turned up four cases in which registered sex offenders had the same addresses as child care providers.

And no children were harmed as a result Those revelations came out Wednesday, after the audit turned up $18 million in fraudulent or questionable state subsidies to child care providers who allegedly bilked the program.

Sen. Alan Lasee, R-De Pere said Children and Families’ secretary Reggie Bicha should resign.

Lasee said the problems start at the top and if this were the private sector, heads would have rolled a long time ago.

But Bicha blamed the problems on the officials who came before him. He said they assumed child care providers would be honest and his agency has done more in the last 14 months to address the program’s fraud than at any time since Wisconsin Shares was created in 1997.

Bicha is scheduled to meet next Tuesday with the Legislature’s Joint Finance Committee, which wants an explanation on his plans to address the fraud and now, the allegations of child endangerment. Sen. Bob Jauch, D-Poplar, says he and others plan to introduce a bill next week to solve Wisconsin Shares’ problems.

Among other thing, it calls for more frequent background checks of prospective care providers and suspending state payments to those under criminal investigations. It also includes a host of new safeguards.

Tags: wisconsin shares, child care program, wisconsin, corruption