The Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction (DPI) told lawmakers on Wednesday that it did not violate open meetings law during a 2024 standards setting meeting and that additional staff would help fulfill open records requests.

Republican lawmakers and conservatives have continued to scrutinize the agency over new state standards that were adopted in 2024. Recently, they have turned their attention to a four-day meeting held in June 2024 at Chula Vista, a water park resort in the Wisconsin Dells. The purpose of the meeting was to set new state testing standards for the Forward Exam, the standardized test that Wisconsin third graders through eighth graders take each year. The event brought together 88 educators and DPI staff to discuss and help set the new standards.

Republicans on the Assembly Government Operations, Accountability and Transparency Committee (GOAT) called the informational hearing to ask the agency about its policies, procedures and compliance regarding open meetings laws and open records laws as well as the standard-setting and benchmarking process for the Forward Exam.

The hearing was scheduled one day after the Institute for Reforming Government (IRG), a conservative-leaning nonpartisan think tank, filed a complaint in Adams County, alleging that the state agency violated open meetings law with the 2024 meeting. The suit asks that the Adams County district attorney bring charges against DPI and seek a declaration that they repeatedly violated Wisconsin’s open meetings law. The DA has 20 days to decide.

Rep. Nate Gustafson (R-Omro) said there appeared to be “a lot of fog” around the meeting.  

“You have this meeting that happened that we have no records of other than a private vendor worked with DPI on standardized testing,” Gustafson said. “Then we have the superintendent come out and lower standards across schools, and there is this cost with no record of what the standard is.”

Andrew Hoyer-Booth, DPI legislative liaison, told lawmakers at the start of the hearing that it’s a “distraction” from DPI’s work.

“Modernizing our standards and assessments to align with the education landscape in Wisconsin and meet the needs of our students was a multi-year effort,” Hoyer-Booth said. “While those who don’t like the outcome seek to attack the process, the DPI is focused on the pressing issues of school funding, student academic achievement, educator recruitment and retention and student mental health.” 

Lawmakers were prompted to look into the waterpark meeting by a report from Brian Fraley for the Dairyland Sentinel and complaints that the paper’s open records requests weren’t fulfilled for more than a year by DPI.

“I just think the public expects that when a record is requested that they do receive it in a reasonable amount of time, and I don’t think it’s unreasonable for people to think that this amount of time is an unreasonable amount of time,” Assembly Majority Leader Tyler August (R-Walworth) said. 

Rich Judge, an assistant state superintendent, said Data Recognition Corporation (DRC), the vendor DPI works with each year to update the assessment and ensure it is valid and up to date, is a private company not a governmental body subject to Wisconsin’s open meeting laws.

“DRC is not a government body. It is a private contractor in the same way that Microsoft is not a government body, Apple’s not a government body. People who do business with the Department of Public Instruction — those are contractors who perform a service for it,” he said.

Judge compared the work DRC did for DPI to the Legislature hiring lawyers to help with  redistricting or state agencies contracting with engineering firms or software companies. 

Judge likened the meeting to “a lot of middle-aged people taking the SAT for an entire day or two.” He said the content of the meeting was confidential because it involves evaluating real test questions that could go before students. 

“The standard-setting information is all public information, and it’s all readily available information, and it gets reviewed regularly, but as it relates to the specific meeting or this specific part of that conference, that was not a public meeting,” Judge said. 

Rep. Mike Bare (D-Verona) said he didn’t see a reason for the committee hearing. 

“It seems to me the motive behind this hearing — and the complaint  — is it fits the majority’s ongoing and systematic efforts to dismantle public education,” Bare said. 

“You’re required by a statute to do this work,” Bare told DPI representatives.  It’s in the public interest that you do this work. I think we appreciate that you do this work and just like all state government entities, you do value openness, complying with those statutes, complying with open records, complying with open meetings where it’s appropriate, where it makes sense. You gave a good argument for why, in this case… those laws don’t apply.”

DPI paid more than $368,000 for the meeting and work by the contractor. 

The meeting, according to DPI, cost about $219,000, which included lodging, meals, travel reimbursement, meeting expenses, laptops and hotspots. The remaining cost was for the work done by DRC included planning, facilitating the meeting and writing a final report.

Nedweski said the amount is “pretty mind-blowing.” DPI said, however, that the cost is less than what other states pay for similar efforts.

DPI said the total cost of the standards-setting work was about $30,740 per grade and subject. Similar work done by DRC for other states has ranged from $48,500 to $94,000 per grade/subject, according to DPI. 

Judge noted that the “distinguished” co-chair of the Joint Finance Committee Rep. Mark Born (R-Beaver Dam) found the meeting to be a “routine conference.” Lawmakers on the Joint Finance Committee delayed the release of funds for the agency so they could review the spending for the conference after the Dairyland Sentinel report. Born made the comments after the committee decided to release the funds to the agency. 

“All due respect to my esteemed colleague, I’m in disagreement with him on this being an appropriate amount to spend,” Nedweski said. “Only one-third of the kids in the state can read at grade level. What are we getting for this?”

Judge said he thought Nedweski was making a “political argument” that was out of the scope of the hearing’s purpose. He added that there are only about two contractors in the U.S. who do the type of standards-setting work needed.

“There are plenty of folks who think that assessments are not appropriate, but this legislative body is not one of them. They have regularly required that we have state assessments. It certainly would be in your power as a legislator to say we’re not going to do standardized testing anymore,” Judge said.

When it comes to timing on fulfilling requests, Hoyer-Booth said the agency is in compliance with state law, but noted that DPI has received over 1,000 open records requests between Jan. 1, 2023 and April 2026. He said there are two factors that affect response times: the simplicity of the request and the agency’s finite staff. There are no staff members dedicated to fulfilling these requests.

“The same staff responsible for investigating teacher licensing and educator misconduct are the same individuals tasked with fulfilling open records requests,” Hoyer-Booth said. “DPI believes firmly that our agency must prioritize urgent matters, particularly investigations involving student safety. We hope the committee does that as well.”

Bare suggested that lawmakers advocate for additional staffing resources for the agency to fulfill requests in a more timely manner. 

“If you’re interested in pushing in the next budget for DPI to have the resources that they need to be responsive in a more timely way. Would you be interested in a bill now to get them attorney positions, records specialists to get them what they need to be more timely compliant?” Bare asked Nedweski. “Are you willing to commit to that?”

“The taxpayers are getting more and more frustrated because they’re not seeing outcomes. We’re spending more and more per student, and we have less outcomes —  we’re not going to talk about that,” Nedweski said.

“That’s what the hearing’s about,” Bare said. 

“I think that they have plenty of resources. One of the things they could do is probably bring people back to work in the office,” Nedweski said. “They have so many people working remotely.”

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Republican lawmakers left open Gov. Tony Evers’ special session on gerrymandering on Tuesday, saying they want to have further conversations with Evers about the issue. Evers and Democratic lawmakers criticized the lack of action. In a statement, Evers said “there’s nothing to negotiate.” 

The open-ended special session began even as lawmakers and Evers continue to discuss a possible deal on property taxes and school funding.

Evers announced his intention to call the special session in February, urging lawmakers to pass a constitutional amendment to ban partisan gerrymandering. He officially ordered the session in March. The constitutional amendment would include language to expressly prohibit drawing districts that give a disproportionate advantage or disadvantage to any political party. It would not lay out a new process for drawing maps.

Wisconsin adopted new legislative maps in 2024 following a state Supreme Court decision that found the previous maps were an unconstitutional gerrymander. The maps will be in place until 2030 when redistricting happens again. Unless there is a change to the current process, lawmakers will again be in charge of drawing new maps in 2031.

Ahead of the noon start time for the session, Assembly Speaker Robin Vos (R-Rochester) and Assembly Majority Leader Tyler August (R-Walworth) announced their intentions to leave the session open in a statement. They said they did so in “an effort to continue meaningful dialogue.”

“We view the Governor’s proposal as a first step on which to build a more comprehensive, workable solution for Wisconsin,” the leaders said, adding that they want a face-to-face meeting with Evers to discuss ideas. “We’re committed to a transparent and balanced solution that reflects the interest of all Wisconsinites.”

Evers, who is serving his last year in office, has called special sessions many times over his two terms including on abortion, gun violence and the state budget. Republicans typically have gaveled in and out of them without taking action or have completely rewritten his proposals.

Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu said in a statement that “any changes to the current process have to be made intentionally and specifically using normal legislative procedure” and that “leaving the special session open allows the legislature to gain public input in order to make an informed decision on how to proceed.” 

“In nearly every instance in which Republicans did not immediately gavel out of the governor’s special sessions, Republicans simply quietly gaveled out months later, largely to avoid press interest, bad headlines, and public scrutiny and accountability,” Evers’ spokesperson Britt Cudaback wrote in a social media post.

The Senate and Assembly adjourned until Thursday morning. 

Evers said in a statement after that there is “nothing to negotiate” and urged lawmakers to take action on the constitutional amendment. 

“Rigging maps so that one political party stays in power is wrong, it’s anti-democratic, and it’s un-American — there’s nothing to negotiate because there’s no room for compromise when it comes to making sure Wisconsinites’ voices matter and their votes count,” Evers said. “This is a first step — if we don’t get a ban on partisan gerrymandering put in Wisconsin’s constitution, lawmakers will never be forced to create the independent and nonpartisan redistricting process Wisconsinites deserve. Lawmakers either want to ban partisan gerrymandering in Wisconsin or they don’t.” 

As the Republican leaders in the Assembly and Senate gaveled in and adjourned the sessions, Democratic members remained on  the floor of each chamber to voice their opposition to Republicans’ lack of action.

Senate Minority Leader Dianne Hesselbein (D-Middleton) and Sen. Mark Spreitzer (D-Beloit) held a press conference to criticize Republican lawmakers for not showing up to debate the measure.

“It is a shame that Senate Republicans are refusing to do their jobs when the Senate Democrats are in the Senate chamber, ready to discuss, debate and pass the constitutional amendment banning partisan gerrymandering,” Hesselbein said. 

Hesselbein said every Senate Democrat would have voted in favor of the proposal. She also said that none of her Republican Senate colleagues had contacted her and she didn’t know whether they actually planned to come back. 

Spreitzer said that gerrymandering has led to elected officials ignoring issues that matter to voters. 

“We’re seeing the last vestiges of that right now, as lame duck Republicans who are afraid to run on fair maps aren’t even coming in to take up this issue ahead of this coming election,” he said. “We only have fair legislative maps now because of court action, but our work is not done. There will be another redistricting cycle after the next census after 2030, and we need to lock in constitutional protections to make sure that our maps are never gerrymandered again.” 

Spreitzer noted that the constitutional amendment would also provide legal grounds for a court challenge if there are gerrymander attempts in the future.

As a constitutional amendment, Evers’ proposal would need to pass in two consecutive sessions of the state Legislature before it would go to voters for the final say. 

Bianca Shaw, the Wisconsin state director for Common Cause, told the Wisconsin Examiner that the lawmakers subverted expectations for the session, but that she hopes it isn’t just about “optics” and that policymakers will take the time to listen to Wisconsinites about the issue. 

“I think that what the constituents want, what voters want, is most important,” Shaw said. “I think that it is constructive that it wasn’t outright dismissed but words alone won’t help reform, and so what I’m looking for is for legislative leaders to go into their communities and see what their constituents want.” 

Shaw said she thinks there are some shifts happening in lawmakers’ openness in part due to upcoming elections and as many are facing competitive races.

“I think that what is happening right now in the state of Wisconsin is our legislators, on both sides, on all sides, are understanding that they have to earn their votes.”

Shaw said the constitutional amendment would be a valuable signal, but not the full solution. Common Cause, which is a part of the Fair Maps Coalition, supports an independent redistricting commission proposal, which would take the job of drawing maps out of lawmakers’ hands. 

Negotiations on property taxes, school funding

Gerrymandering is not the only issue lawmakers and Evers are considering as they continue to seek a deal on tax relief and school funding. 

Wisconsin has a surplus of more than $2 billion and policymakers are seeking to tap it to provide property tax relief to citizens, who have seen large increases in their bills, as well as to  provide additional funding to school districts, which have seen a steady decline in state aid.

According to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Evers told reporters on Monday that he and lawmakers were still talking about a potential deal.

“Before they disappear completely from Madison we need to get that done,” Evers said. “So we’re still talking.” 

According to WisPolitics, Vos said in a social media post that he had been in discussions with Evers for nearly a month and “our proposal encompasses property tax relief, rebate checks, tax exemption on tips and overtime, and enhanced special education funding for schools.” 

Other members of the Assembly Republican caucus, including Rep. Calvin Callahan (R-Tomahawk) also posted about the framework for the deal. 

However, it is unclear whether Senate Republicans are part of those negotiations or whether they are close to agreeing. LeMahieu declared that he was excluded from previous negotiations and the Senate did not go along with what Vos and Evers agreed. 

“Let’s hope we can convene the Legislature (we need the GOP State Senate to agree) soon so we can get this package enacted,” Vos said.

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