Press Release: Gov. Evers to Ask Legislature to Approve Largest Increase in State Support for UW System in Over Two Decades

“Our UW System is the economic engine of our state and a critical part of our state’s future success. One thing I know many Republican legislators and I have in common is that we wouldn’t be where we are today without the education we received from our public universities and the UW System,” Gov. Evers continued. “And yet, even as we face generational, statewide workforce challenges in Wisconsin, Republicans not only unconstitutionally withheld pay raises and obstructed capital building projects but have consistently refused to fully approve the important investments I’ve consistently requested over the last five years.

“The simple fact is this: finally addressing the challenges facing students, faculty, and staff at our UW System campuses through meaningful long-term investments must be a top priority for the next state budget. I will be asking the Legislature to approve the largest increase in state support for the UW System in more than two decades,” Gov. Evers said. “UW campuses are already making difficult decisions, laying off and furloughing employees and restructuring and cutting altogether important programs and operations and staff, making student retention more difficult, and students, faculty, and staff shouldn’t be expected to singlehandedly bear the costs of the Legislature’s lack of meaningful state investment for the last decade.

“Investing in the UW System is critical if we want to address our state’s workforce challenges and be able to compete to recruit, train, and retain talented workers. Wisconsinites deserve a UW System that is fully funded, fully functioning, and that meets the needs of our students, our workforce, and our local communities. The Legislature must step up, and that’s what I’ll be asking them to do once again in my next proposed budget,” Gov. Evers concluded.

Most recently, during the 2023-25 biennial budget process, Republicans in the Wisconsin State Legislature rejected Gov. Evers’ proposed investments in the UW System, choosing instead to divert more than $31 million to the Joint Finance Committee supplemental appropriation—a fund controlled by the committee’s Republican majority, which persistently refuses to expeditiously release already-approved investments from the fund—and attempting to cut 188 positions relating to efforts around diversity and equity, the latter of which Gov. Evers was able to ensure UW could retain through his broad, constitutional veto authority.    

In light of Republican lawmakers’ failure to meaningfully invest in the UW System, Gov. Evers, a month after enacting the biennial budget, called a special session of the Legislature for September 2023 for the Legislature to take up his comprehensive workforce plan, which included an additional more than $100 million investment in the state’s higher education institutions, including an additional $66.4 million for the UW System to help recruit, train, and retain talent in an effort to bolster the state’s workforce.