Child Tax Credit Applications Now Open
State residents with children under age 18 can apply for one-time, $100 tax credit.
Gov. Scott Walker at Shopko in Sussex to highlight the launch of the $100-Per-Child Tax Rebate application. Photo from the State of Wisconsin.
Beginning yesterday, Wisconsin residents with children under the age of 18 could apply for a one-time, $100 tax credit. The credit comes at a cost of about $130 million, and at a time when Gov. Scott Walker is gearing up for his re-election bid.
Parents and guardians will have until July 2 to apply for the rebate. Caregivers are eligible for the $100 tax credit for every child they have living in their home under the age of 18 as of December 31, 2017. They can apply online or over the phone through the state Department of Revenue.
Wisconsin Department of Revenue Secretary Rick Chandler said he thinks there’s going to be a lot of interest. It should take less than three weeks for applicants to get their credit once they’ve applied, and the DOR will have staff available to help process the requests.
“It will really help middle class families, especially working families with children,” he said. “And that’s where we think there’s a tremendous need for tax relief, and this takes care of that.”
Along with the child tax credit, Walker used his veto power to expand the late-summer sales tax holiday from two days to five days.
Democrats have criticized Walker’s move, saying it was politically motivated.
Assembly Minority Leader Rep. Gordon Hintz, D-Oshkosh, said there are better ways to spend this money.
“And of course with $130 million we could have fixed lead pipes,” he said. “We could have tested all the rape kits that are sitting around. We could have expanded rural broadband, or we could have kept our budget intact given that we face a pretty significant structural deficit heading into the next year.”
Hintz said this shows Walker is trying to gain favor with voters heading into the election in November.
Walker announced the credit in his State of the State address in January. He also used his veto pen to allow grandparents and other primary caregivers to receive the credit.
Listen to the discussion here.
Child Tax Credit Applications Open Tuesday was originally published by Wisconsin Public Radio.
Bribes, scams and gimmicks in an election year are all Career Politician and republicans have left. Their era of shameful, corrupt political shenanigans must come to end in the November midterms
Dump Walker 2018
I’ll take the money…but I’m also not fooled. Walker should have been doing more to look out for working class families this whole time he’s been in office.
Does this credit apply to residents who currently don’t have high enough income to actually PAY income tax ( like the new federal child credit does? If not, it ignores the bottom 20% or so of households in WI.
A minimum wage increase would be much more help to working families as it would apply to working children as well as their parents in many cases. A quick gimmick is so much easier than actual legislation for working families.