MADISON (WKOW) -- Governor Tony Evers announced Tuesday the state reached an agreement with U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Food and Nutrition Service to provide an additional $70 million per month in emergency food aid.
The Department of Health Services lost out on more than $50 million for the month of May and would have continued to lose funding that went to about 255,000 households.
Under the Families First Coronavirus Response Act of 2020, states that had declared a public health emergency received additional funds for food assistance. The state supreme court ruled on March 31 the governor does not have the authority of issue new extensions of an emergency order after 60 days.
Tuesday afternoon, prospects of a legislative solution to restore the extra federal funding looked grim. Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester) said Democrats should join Republicans in overriding Evers's veto of a GOP that would've allowed Evers to issue emergency orders for the purpose of securing federal aid.
Evers and Democrats objected to multiple provisions in that bill, including measures that would've banned private employers from requiring vaccination and would've given the legislature control over future federal aid.
"I hope my Democratic colleagues will join us in overriding the veto and I'm happy to bring that up at some point in the future," Vos said in a press conference. "Frankly, I have not gotten any offers from the Democrats to work with us on finding a solution."
Evers said later in the afternoon the administration was close to finding a solution that wouldn't require the legislature.
"We should have some very good news in the near future so yes, we've been working with them to find a workaround and so we we'll be making that announcement in the near future," Evers said on a DHS press call.
Two hours later, the administration announced the deal, which increased Wisconsin's haul to $70 million that would serve about 400,000 households for at least two months.
A DHS spokeswoman did not respond to questions Tuesday about why the new deal would bring more money and reach more people than the previous package.
However, theUSDA announced April 1it was providing an additional $1 billion per month in SNAP benefits, making more Americans eligible for the emergency food relief.
The deal was made possible by USDA and FNS agreeing Tuesday to accept analternate declarationfrom DHS secretary-designee Karen Timberlake, keeping up the flow of benefits.
“More than $70 million a month means we can get support to a lot of folks across our state who are still struggling in the midst of a pandemic and need help putting food on the table,” Evers said in the statement. “I’m proud we were able to work with our federal partners to come to an agreement that will ensure we can keep providing these critical resources to Wisconsinites across our state.”
Vos's Communications Director, Kit Beyer, said Tuesday she was waiting to discuss with Vos whether legislative leaders would challenge the legality of Timberlake's April 8 declaration.
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