Rep. Christian Phelps, D-Eau Claire.
Christian Phelps: Stop robbing ‘Wisconsin children of a fully funded public education.’
School districts across the state are required by state and federal law to provide special education to eligible students. But the cost is largely borne by local taxpayers.
The state Legislature covered about one-third of Wisconsin school districts’ special education costs in the 2023-25 budget. According to a Legislative Fiscal Bureau memo, prepared at the request of newly elected Rep. Christian Phelps, D-Eau Claire, had those costs been fully reimbursed, around one in five of the school referendums held in 2024 could have been avoided.
“In 20% of cases, this unreimbursed special education is the same or greater than the amount they ask for in the referendum,” says Phelps. “In tons of other cases, you can see that the numbers are similar, or at the minimum, that the number would have significantly reduced the need for a referendum.”
The Legislative Fiscal Bureau memo compared the price tag of the referendums on the ballot in 2024 to the respective districts’ unreimbursed special education costs from 2022-23, the most recent available data.
Irrespective of available funding, state and federal law requires that public and charter schools provide students with disabilities appropriate “modifications, aids and related services free of charge,” according to the U.S. Department of Education. When school districts do not receive enough state and federal funding to cover the costs of special education, they pull from their general funds to fill the shortfall.
The Madison school district used $66.4 million from its general fund last year to cover unreimbursed 2025 special education costs. Superintendent Joe Gothard says he does not yet know how much the school district will have to pull this year, but given inflationary changes, “it’s going to be more unless there’s a policy change.”
Gothard says the additional funding could have helped Madison’s school district avoid the $100 million tax referendum for operational expenses that voters approved in November.
“It’s hard to project what the [upcoming] years might look like,” Gothard says. “But I know right now that if we had $66.4 million of additional revenue, it’s likely that we would not have even gone to our public in the fall for our $100 million increase. Or [the increase] would have been reduced.”
Gov. Tony Evers is calling for the state to reimburse 60% of special education costs in his 2025-27 budget proposal, but it’s unlikely Republicans will approve that increase. Although Gothard respects that Evers must manage “limited” funding while navigating partisan divides, he would still like to see the reimbursement fully funded. Phelps, a member of the Assembly Committee on Education and former special education teaching aide, agrees: “Every year that we keep doing it this way is a year that we have robbed Wisconsin children of a fully funded public education.”
