Stimulus Funds Spent on Insurance, Utility Bills
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By Bill Osmulski
MacIver News Service
Wisconsin School District Justifies Unusual Stimulus Spending –
A $416,219.32 payment to WEA Trust for health insurance and $237,861.68 to utility companies from the New Holstein School District raises questions about how school districts across the country were allowed to spend federal stimulus money.
The MacIver Institute has been reviewing how stimulus funds have been spent in Wisconsin. The disbursement of American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) funds to WEA Trust, the health insurance and financial services company operated by the state’s teachers’ union, piqued our interests and prompted us to do some further digging.
The only other school district to spend stimulus money for health insurance was Frederic, and that amount was $97,527. Other districts, including Green Bay and Madison, told the MacIver Institute that stimulus money could not be spent on employee benefits or utility costs.
The general guidance districts followed was stimulus money should “supplement, not supplant” funding for educational expenses. In other words, it couldn’t be spent on anything previously paid with other funds.
Posted under News.
Tags: Education, MacIver, Stimulus
8:11 am on March 8th, 2010
And yet, they are disolving the entire business program. They have already informed two teachers that they will no longer have a position next year and it still has not been voted by the school board. We should also question where the $8,000.00 from the DECA fund raising went, the principal some how can not account for it.