Governor proposes key investments to fight PFAS contamination statewide, remove lead from service lines, homes, and schools

Gov. Evers announces largest increase in state’s history for stewardship program to preserve natural resources and spaces for future generations.

MADISON — Gov. Tony Evers on Feb 18th night, during his 2025-27 Biennial Budget Message, announced his 2025-27 Executive Budget includes a comprehensive plan and investments to combat per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) contamination statewide, protect kids and families from harmful water contaminants like lead, and expand access to clean and safe drinking water for Wisconsinites across the state. Tonight, the governor also shared his budget includes the largest increased investment in state history for the successful Knowles-Nelson Stewardship Program (Stewardship Program) and reauthorizes the program for the next 10 years, aiming to preserve natural resources and spaces for future generations of Wisconsinites.

Gov. Evers kicked off the Year of The Kid making several critical announcements to ensure kids and families have access to safe, clean drinking water. The governor’s 2025-27 Executive Budget will:

• Invest over $145 million to fight PFAS contamination statewide and expand eligibility for key programs aimed at improving water quality. The governor’s comprehensive plan includes:
• Providing funding for emergency resources like bottled water to households and communities impacted by water contamination; 
• Protecting innocent landowners like farmers who unknowingly spread biosolids containing PFAS on their land and invest in helping clean up biosolid contamination; and 
• Strengthening PFAS standards statewide by adopting public health-based groundwater standards for six PFAS contaminants; 
• Address lead poisoning in homes, schools, and communities across the state by investing over $300 million in numerous initiatives aimed at removing lead service lines and keeping Wisconsinites’ drinking water and environment free from lead;
• Expand and increase funding for the Well Compensation and Well Abandonment Grant Program to continue the Evers Administration’s work getting harmful contaminants out of private wells, including PFAS; and
• Reauthorize the Stewardship Program for another 10 years, providing $100 million for the program annually for a total investment of $1 billion to continue supporting projects that improve the state’s water quality, protect key habitats, and support investments in state and local parks and other public lands across the state that improve the quality of life of residents and visitors to Wisconsin alike.

Relevant excerpts from Gov. Evers’ 2025-27 Biennial Budget Message are available below:

“... An important part of doing what’s best for our kids is reducing exposure to dangerous chemicals and getting harmful contaminants out of our water. Every Wisconsinite should have access to clean and safe drinking water no matter where they live. Tonight, I’m introducing my plan to combat water pollution and improve water quality across Wisconsin. Lead exposure and poisoning is especially dangerous.

“There is no safe level of lead exposure for kids—even a small exposure can affect a kid for life, reducing learning capacity and attention span, and affecting academic achievement. So, I approved an emergency rule strengthening our lead standards statewide and announced new investments to support kids and families when they are exposed to lead.

“But we should be working to prevent our kids from ever being exposed to lead in the first place. In the last few weeks, Wisconsin has seen cases of lead poisoning in kids who were exposed to dangerous levels of lead at school. At school, folks. That should never happen anywhere in Wisconsin. Period. We have to work together to fix this. Tonight, I’m asking for bipartisan support to invest over $300 million to help get lead out of our service lines, bubblers, schools, homes, and child care centers for good.

“And lead is just one contaminant that’s affecting kids, families, and water across our state. Let’s talk about PFAS. ‘Forever chemicals’ like PFAS are chemicals that have been used for decades in things like non-stick cookware, firefighting foam, and even food packaging. PFAS exposure at certain levels can mean developmental delays in kids, increased cholesterol levels, reduced immunity response to infections, and even heightened risk of some cancers.

“Addressing PFAS and other contaminants grows harder and more expensive with each day of delay. Republicans and Democrats must work together to finally get something done on this issue. As part of my comprehensive plan to improve water quality statewide, we’re working to strengthen Wisconsin’s groundwater standards for PFAS. And I’m asking the Legislature to support my investment of over $145 million to fight PFAS contamination statewide and provide emergency resources like bottled water to families and communities affected by water contamination.

“Cleaning up our water is a key part of our work to keep kids and families across Wisconsin healthy and safe. But we should also invest in preserving our natural resources, increasing outdoor recreation opportunities, and expanding access to public lands for hunting, trapping, and fishing. So, let’s reauthorize the Knowles-Nelson Stewardship Program for another decade, and let’s do it with bipartisan support. Let’s deliver on our promise to our kids and grandkids of a better state—and world—than what we inherited. ...”

ADDRESSING LEAD CONTAMINATION AND ENSURING CLEAN DRINKING WATER FOR KIDS AND FAMILIES
Gov. Evers kicked off 2025 the Year of the Kid by approving a new emergency rule to combat lead poisoning statewide by lowering the lead poisoning threshold to 3.5 µg/dL.

No level of lead is considered safe for kids. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), even the smallest exposure to lead in childhood can have serious, long-term consequences and can even “reduce a child’s learning capacity, ability to pay attention, and academic achievement.” Additionally, a 2019 study of kids across several early grade levels found that even low-level lead exposure during early childhood can affect a kid’s achievement, including reading and math scores. It also showed that even physically maturing and additional schooling “are not sufficient to offset the damage caused by early childhood exposure.”

In 2021, the CDC lowered the blood lead level at which it recommends intervention in cases of lead poisoning to 3.5 µg/dL rather than 5 µg/dL, which was the previous state value. According to the Wisconsin Department of Health Services (DHS), between November 2021 and February 2024, approximately 3,272 kids had blood lead levels between 3.5 and 4.9 micrograms per 100 milliliters of blood, but they did not qualify to receive environmental intervention services because they did not meet the definitions of “lead poisoning or exposure” provided in the statute. DHS estimates that about 1,400 kids are expected to have a blood level between 3.5 and 4.9 micrograms of lead per 100 milliliters of blood in 2025, and this emergency rule allows those kids to be eligible for environmental intervention services. By lowering the lead poisoning threshold, Gov. Evers will help make more kids and families eligible for lead poisoning and intervention resources.

In order to support the expanded eligibility for environmental intervention services for lead-poisoned kids under DHS’s emergency rule approved by Gov. Evers and address this serious concern for the health and well-being of Wisconsin kids, Gov. Evers also announced his 2025-27 Executive Budget will provide over $6 million over the biennium to increase grants to local health departments to support lead poisoning intervention and response, including education programming, screening, care coordination or follow up services for kids not covered by a third-party payer, and other activities related to poisoning or exposure. Each health department would receive at least a $40,000 increase, with an average award increase of $50,700 and jurisdictions with more cases of lead poisoning would receive more funding.

Ensuring Clean, Safe Water at Home, School, and in the Community
According to a 2023 report from the Wisconsin Policy Forum, more than 37,000 lead service lines have been replaced or turned off since 2018, which is more lines replaced or turned off in just five years than in the previous two decades. The report further states that while “this trend represents massive progress from previous decades, these service lines still lurk underground in scores of communities across the state,” underscoring the urgent need to address this issue, most especially in spaces that care for Wisconsin’s youth and kids, such as schools, daycares, and more. At least 134,000 households in Wisconsin are still served by lead service lines, and local communities need support from the state to remove and replace these lead service lines.

The governor’s budget will invest more than $300 million to help get lead out of our pipes, bubblers, schools, homes, and child care centers. The governor’s plan makes sure kids and families have clean, safe drinking water at home, school, daycare, and in the community by:

• Modifying statutes to allow utilities to provide financial assistance in the form of 100 percent grant funding for the replacement of lead service lines (LSL) for property owners. Current law restricts utilities from providing more than 50 percent of the cost of replacing lead service lines, meaning all property owners, regardless of income, pay a portion of replacing their own water service lines if they contain lead. The cost of replacing a customer-side LSL varies by location but generally ranges from $2,000 to $6,000 per line. This is cost-prohibitive for many low-income customers and potentially places them at risk of service disconnection;
• Investing $7.1 million specifically to aid in-home child care providers across Milwaukee County in ensuring lead-free drinking water for their facilities;
• Proposing a $200 million investment to accelerate the removal of lead service lines across the state. This investment will increase the capacity for communities to remove these lines quicker to protect Wisconsin households; and
• Providing grants to school districts and independent charter schools to replace water fountains with water bottle filling stations with filtration systems to reduce contaminants in water, including lead and chlorine, through a $250,000 investment through his “Healthy Meals, Healthy Kids” initiative.

In addition to drinking lead-poisoned water, lead poisoning among kids is typically caused by swallowing or breathing in dust from lead-based paint in homes that were built before 1978. Therefore, Gov. Evers recommends relaunching the Windows Plus Program with a $100 million investment to support lead-safe renovations in schools, homes, and child care centers.

FIGHTING PFAS CONTAMINATION STATEWIDE
Since taking office, identifying and remediating contamination in ground, surface, and drinking water has been a top priority for Gov. Evers and the Evers Administration. Gov. Evers declared 2019 the Year of Clean Drinking Water to highlight the need for meaningful investments to ensure Wisconsinites have clean, safe drinking water that is free of harmful contaminants like PFAS, lead, and nitrate. Additionally, Gov. Evers created the PFAS Action Council to develop a statewide PFAS Action Plan, which led to key protections such as Wisconsin’s first enforceable statewide standards for PFAS in surface and drinking water.

Building upon this work, the final 2023-25 biennial budget signed by Gov. Evers included a $125 million investment to address and prevent PFAS contamination statewide—one of the first real and meaningful investments by Republican legislators to address PFAS. Republican lawmakers who control the Legislature’s Joint Committee on Finance have refused to release those funds to date, which were approved nearly 600 days ago now.

The governor’s 2025-27 Executive Budget proposal once again outlines a comprehensive plan to address PFAS contamination for both private well owners and municipalities across surface, drinking, and groundwater and allocates over $145 million to address PFAS head-on. This investment includes the $125 million secured through the 2023-25 biennial budget process. Gov. Evers’ 2025-27 Executive Budget proposals to improve water quality, combat PFAS and water contaminants, and expand access to clean and safe drinking water are detailed below.

First, Gov. Evers proposes transferring the full balance of the PFAS Trust Fund—more than $125 million—to the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) to enable the DNR to immediately begin assisting communities and homeowners struggling with PFAS contamination. The DNR will utilize this funding in addition to newly allocated funding to:

• Create a PFAS Community Grant Program to assist municipal drinking water systems with testing for and eliminating PFAS from drinking water, in partnership with the Safe Drinking Water Loan program ($96.4 million);
• Help private well owners sample and test their private wells through a new County PFAS Well Testing Grant Program ($4 million);
• Research effective destruction and disposal methods of PFAS and implement proven strategies to dispose and eliminate PFAS ($14.65 million);
• Provide grants to local businesses and communities to help reduce or eliminate their use or release of PFAS into the environment ($6.35 million); and
• Conduct statewide research, including sampling and testing for PFAS to better understand its prevalence ($11.81 million).

The governor’s comprehensive PFAS plan also includes an additional nearly $2 million for emergency response resources, such as bottled water for homes and communities affected by PFAS contamination.

Importantly, Gov. Evers’ proposal includes liability protections from remediation requirements for innocent landowners who unknowingly allowed the spreading of biosolids containing PFAS on their land. A farmer who accepted biosolids for land spreading on their fields should not be held responsible for remediating PFAS contamination if they did not know PFAS was in those biosolids, and this proposal ensures those folks are not held financially responsible for the cleanup.

Gov. Evers’ proposal allocates $7 million in new funding for sampling, testing, and remediation of PFAS contamination for innocent landowners, ensuring the harmful chemicals are removed and innocent landowners’ health is protected. The proposal also expands and increases the frequency of biosolids sampling and testing for PFAS and requires authorized biosolid spreaders to report to the landowner if PFAS is detected in their biosolids, helping prevent contaminated biosolids from being land spread and better protecting Wisconsin land and waters.

Gov. Evers is also proposing increasing funding by $5 million and expanding eligibility for the state’s Well Compensation Grant Program to allow more Wisconsinites to access this program, including increasing the household income eligibility cap for the program and adding PFAS contamination to the list of contaminants eligible for funding to replace or add a treatment system to a household’s contaminated private water well. Modeled off the federally funded Well Compensation Grant Program the governor created in 2022, these eligibility updates will significantly increase participation and use of this critical program. This is in addition to the $5 million in additional federal funding the governor announced during his 2025 State of the State address last month to support the expanded Well Compensation and Well Abandonment Grant Program.

As he has proposed previously, the governor’s 2025-27 Executive Budget also recommends providing the appropriate, needed staffing at the DNR and DHS to quickly and effectively respond to discovered PFAS contamination. This includes nearly $1.6 million over the biennium and 10 full-time staff positions at DNR and $185,400 over the biennium and one full-time position at DHS. DHS is also allocated $1.26 million to conduct biomonitoring studies across the state to assess Wisconsinite’s PFAS exposure level.

Finally, the governor is also recommending the adoption of major policies in the CLEAR Act, first introduced by Gov. Evers in 2021 with Democratic lawmakers. This includes:

• Exempting DNR rulemaking relating to setting enforceable PFAS standards from the REINS Act;
• Prohibiting land spreading of biosolids if the PFAS levels exceed levels set by DNR in a WPDES permit;
• Requiring a person who generates solid or hazardous waste at a site or facility under investigation by DNR to provide DNR with access to information relating to any transportation to or treatment, storage, or disposal at another site, facility, or location;
• Authorizing DNR to require proof of financial responsibility from individuals or businesses that possess or control PFAS. Financial responsibility would be intended to ensure means of addressing potential discharges or contamination, including emergency responses, remedial action, and long-term care of contaminated sites;
• Enabling the DNR to prioritize PFAS-related water infrastructure applications from municipalities to the Safe Drinking Water Loan Program in the same way as other contaminants if the proposed project addresses PFAS levels above DHS-recommended health advisory levels;
• Requiring site-specific cleanup planning for entities that handle PFAS chemicals; and
• Allowing DNR to appoint a neutral, third-party mediator to help negotiate between municipalities and responsible parties when one municipality needs to obtain an alternate water source or connect to a water source within a different municipality as a result of PFAS contamination.

REAUTHORIZING AND PROVIDING THE LARGEST-EVER INCREASE FOR THE KNOWLES-NELSON STEWARDSHIP PROGRAM
In addition to his efforts to ensure clean, safe drinking water, Gov. Evers also announced tonight that his 2025-27 Executive Budget will provide the largest increased investment in state history for the Stewardship Program while reauthorizing the program for the next decade. Under the governor’s proposal, the program would be reauthorized through 2036 at $100 million annually for a total investment of $1 billion.

The governor has been a long-time advocate for the continued success of the Stewardship Program. In his 2021-23 Executive Budget, Gov. Evers proposed reauthorizing the Stewardship Program for another 10 years through June 30, 2032, with an annual investment of $70 million. Unfortunately, Republican lawmakers reduced the governor’s proposal, and the program was only reauthorized for another four years. As a result, the Stewardship Program must be reauthorized in the 2025-27 state budget, or the program will expire in 2026, and along with it, the crucial support it provides to local governments, state park friends groups, and land trust and conservation organizations across the state to preserve and protect Wisconsin’s vast and valuable natural resources.

From hunting and fishing to hiking and boating, reauthorizing the Stewardship Program and making real, meaningful investments in its continued success will ensure Wisconsin continues to have clean, green spaces that are protected for generations of Wisconsinites to enjoy for years to come.