Even with Wisconsin’s FoodShare benefits being distributed for November, Rhonda Adams of The River Food Pantry in Madison expects high demand for its services to persist. The federal government shutdown also resulted in upheaval at early learning Head Start programs in the state, including for the 145 preschoolers and 34 staff at the Southwestern Wisconsin Community Action Program — Tawny Hardyman, its director, said nine classrooms are now empty. State Sen. Jesse James has authored a new bill that would set a definition of grooming toward sexual abuse of children in state law, and explained how it can aid bringing predators to justice.
 

Rhonda Adams
Executive director, The River Food Pantry

• FoodShare benefits were restored to Wisconsin households on Nov. 7 when the Evers administration processed the full monthly payments in the overnight hours after a federal judge ordered the Trump administration to fully fund SNAP. That evening, the U.S. Supreme Court stayed the order, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture subsequently demanded that Wisconsin and other states “undo” this action. Over the week without SNAP funding, people seeking help with feeding their families poured into food pantries across the country and around the state. Long lines at the River Food Pantry brought people looking for provisions, including many first-time visitors. Adams said she doesn’t expect demand to slow.
• Adams: “I think people are still going to be apprehensive about — is that really true? Plus, I think that people have found us and now have also found that we’re welcoming, that we are here for them. And so we — I believe we’ll continue to see an uptick in numbers here. Plus we’re coming into the holidays, which is always a busy time for us.”

Tawny Hardyman
Head Start director, Southwestern Wisconsin Community Action Program

• The federal government shutdown, which has taken a step toward ending, has resulted in the abrupt closure of two Head Start programs in Wisconsin, including one that serves 145 children in Grant, Green, Iowa, Lafayette and Richland counties. Hardyman explained how the loss of funding left nine classrooms empty and its effects on families.
• Hardyman: “It’s extremely disruptive. You can imagine as three- or four-year-old children, it takes a little while to transition into a classroom and to get accustomed to things. And then suddenly this routine that they’ve been in every week ends and they’re kind of wondering what’s going on. Additionally, with families, they rely on these classrooms for child care. While some of the families go to work or school, and they have — when they came to our program in September, they would have let go of a different enrollment spot, potentially at another child care provider. This area is also a child care desert in many of our communities. So, they were having struggles trying to find other arrangements for their children if they don’t have family or friends that are able to help them. Another thing that impacts the families is that these children receive breakfast, lunch and snack at our centers every day. Many families were wondering about their food security, additionally.”

State Sen. Jesse James
R-Thorp

• A proposal being circulated in the Wisconsin Legislature would define grooming in state criminal statutes as “a course of conduct, pattern of behavior, or series of acts intended to condition, seduce, or entice a child for the purpose of sexual activity or exploitation.” James authored the bill, which would make grooming a felony with penalties that include prison.
• James: “I think the sensitive crimes that I have investigated as a law enforcement officer, having these additional tools and mechanisms available for charging is extremely valuable. With the amount of times that each grooming act is defined, you could have a person that is charged with multiple felonies with just the grooming statute alone. I think when we get to the courts in the charging of these cases, I think more is better. It brings more negotiation. It brings more potential compromise to not drag these cases out to a 12-person jury trial. It brings on more plea agreements and having these people realize that you’re guilty. I mean, I’ve had a pretty successful career as a sensitive crimes investigator back in the day. and this was never available, but I can specifically think of cases where it’s totally applicable because there seems to be grooming in every single type of child sexual assault case.”

Watch new episodes of Here & Now at 7:30 p.m. on Fridays.