The Wisconsin Partnership for Kids, a coalition seeking stable state funding for after-school and summer programs, wants $10 million a year from the settlement to go directly to programs like Neu-Life Community Development's Safe Place site at Gwen T. Jackson School. The coalition also wants 20% of each year's allocation placed in an endowment to sustain the programs over the long term, according to organizer Jackie Scott.

Under a July state Supreme Court ruling, the decision on how to spend the money rests with Attorney General Josh Kaul, who retained his seat in Tuesday's election. Kaul said the Wisconsin Department of Justice is actively evaluating how to allocate the funds. At least half of the settlement money must target youth mental health and social media harms, and after-school programs are an allowed use. Any money not allocated by January will be spent at Kaul's discretion.

"After-school programs are certainly important," Kaul said, adding that his office has not yet made a final determination on where all the dollars will go. He said many people who have contacted his office about the money have asked about after-school programs.

The need is acute, providers say. At Neu-Life's Safe Place program, children can speak with a Milwaukee County social worker when trauma strikes, and the organization connects families at its two other sites to partner agencies for clinical mental health care. Executive Director Jody Rhodes said that approach marks a shift from eight or nine years ago.

"Now we're very proactive in offering support and resources for the kids and families because we know how hard it is to navigate tragedy or something traumatic," Rhodes said. But she added that helping as many students as possible with limited money is a constant challenge. "It's a constant hustle to keep all our kids served."

In Wisconsin, programs like Safe Place receive no dedicated state funding. Neu-Life's after-school operations rely mostly on Wisconsin Shares subsidies and grants, Rhodes said.

The funding picture has grown more precarious across the sector. In summer 2025, Boys & Girls Clubs of Greater Milwaukee was weeks away from closing more than half its school-based after-school sites after federal money for its 42 Community Learning Centers arrived late. The board had already approved a plan to shrink to fewer than half those sites, said Dave Knutson, senior vice president of government affairs. The doors stayed open when the federal government released the funds on July 21, 2025, 20 days after they were due.

The club received its federal dollars on time this year, but the funding was cut 14% after roughly 15 years of flat funding, Knutson said. At their peak, the club's MPS-based after-school programs collected $1.2 million a year through Child Care Counts, federal pandemic relief that helped nearly 100 after-school programs in Milwaukee Public Schools keep staff and serve more kids. That federal money ran out in 2025, and the state-funded payments that followed ended in June.

Scott argues that after-school programs are often dismissed as optional extras when they are in fact a frontline response to the pressures young people face. The hours between 3 and 6 p.m. are when children are least supervised and most likely to be on their phones, she said, and after-school programs fill that time with in-person connection to peers and trusted adults.

"People see after-school programs as extra, as fluff, when really it can be the antidote to a lot of what ails us," Scott said.

The state Office of Children's Mental Health's 2025 annual report underscores the concern. The share of Wisconsin high school students who feel they belong at school fell from 73.7% in 2013 to 53.6% in 2023, and fewer than half of girls and of Hispanic, Black, lesbian, gay and bisexual students report feeling they belong. The report found that extracurricular activities are linked with less depression and anxiety and give children a basic sense of belonging.

Scott also wants settlement dollars to help children with serious struggles who need clinical support.

Other states offer models. Michigan's grant program for after-school programs has grown from $10 million in 2021, half of it from American Rescue Plan Act funding, to $135 million for the 2026-27 fiscal year. Schools, churches and community groups, including YMCAs and Boys & Girls Clubs, can apply, said Stephanie Van Koevering, director of public affairs for the Michigan Afterschool Partnership. Demand still outpaces supply: in 2025, programs requested $123 million for $57 million available. Each year's funding becomes the baseline for the next push, she said.

"That's a win that we are celebrating today. Tomorrow, it becomes our new floor," Van Koevering said.

Idaho has taken a different route, directing a portion of its tobacco settlement money into a Millennium Fund and, for the past two years, steering some of it to after-school programs through a grant called Beyond the Bell. The first year's amount was about $1.5 million, said Anna Almerico, senior program director with the Idaho Out-of-School Network. But lawmakers decide each year how the fund is spent, meaning the after-school money "can be taken overnight, basically," she said. She would like Idaho to add a dedicated line in the state budget as well.

For Scott, the Meta settlement is a starting point, not a solution. "Ten years seems like a long time, but it's really not," she said. "I want to see investments at every level of government."