State to Overhaul Welfare-to-Work Program

The state of Wisconsin is moving ahead with a plan to overhaul a program designed to move people off welfare into jobs.

The state has received bids from private companies to administer its ‘Welfare to Work’ program, called W2. Only one county — La Crosse — submitted a proposal. Dane County wanted to continue running the W2 program, but did not submit a proposal to do so. Instead, a private nonprofit will help administer the W2 program next year. Dane County Executive Joe Parisi says the jobs center will remain at its current location and continue to have a broad range of services: “If someone needs W2 assistance, they go there, but we also in the same building have folks who can help with emergency services… Such as, if someone is facing homelessness, we have people who can help with job searches, folks can find childcare, it’s all there: one-stop-shop.”

Dane County was part of a statewide coalition objecting to changes in how more W2 services will be contracted out by the Wisconsin’s Department of Children and Families. Secretary Eloise Anderson says job centers will now cover more territory, “So people in certain parts of the state were getting resources — like in Milwaukee they were getting all kinds of advantages to what people in other parts of state (were getting). We looked at it and said, ‘That’s a matter of size.’”