WI: "Schools reporting more students with special needs"; more state funding needed
- The end of childhood
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Jan 29, 2026, NewMedia: Behnke sounds off on education funding crisis
Assemblyman hopes state will address broken funding system
The issue of school districts having to cut budgets or ask voters to approve operational referenda is nothing new, but it’s getting some notice after the Shawano School District announced in January that $1.6 million needs to be cut from operations to balance next year’s budget.
Superintendent Kurt Krizan has previously said that one of the reasons the district has to take the step is because state aid has not kept up with inflation, and with spending limits set on school districts by the state, that leaves the district with limited options.
Rep. Elijah Behnke noted that the Wisconsin Legislature opted not to increase the per pupil funding when it approved the 2025-27 biennial budget. He said that Gov. Tony Evers had already set up a $325 increase per pupil annually for the next 400 years when he signed the previous biennial budget in 2023. . . .
With that move, Behnke believes the burden of education funding has been shifted to local taxpayers.
“We’ve seen, through referendums, the taxes go up,” he said. “Taxes go up, because school boards choose to spend a little bit more.”
Behnke’s office has been hearing a lot of complaints about property taxes, which has some money go to school districts.
He noted that he has visited the school districts in the 6th Assembly District, which includes Menominee County, most of Shawano County and a segment of Oconto County, and some of the stories he’s heard from administrators have concerned him.. . .
Behnke said the legislature tried to help schools in regards to funding for special education, which many have claimed has not been enough to help students to have special needs. He said that the special education funding went from 31% coverage to 42% coverage in 2025 and 45% in 2026, but now schools are reporting more students with special needs, so the funding is not covering as much.
“Schools are still receiving hundreds of millions of dollars more in actual funding than before,” Behnke said. . . .
The decline in student enrollment has come about due to more young couples holding off on having children or even not having children at all, Behnke said. Estimates at the state level show student enrollment could drop as much as 25% in the next 10 years, he said, which means Wisconsin is “racing toward a cliff.”
“I don’t want to see any schools fail while I’m in state government,” Behnke said.
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