Severe Wisconsin weather events come with a cost. This time for WisDOT.

Back in May, the state sent out $16.9 million in disaster assistance funding to deal with repairs and other damages that accompanied specific severe weather events in 2025 and 2026. And now on Tuesday, the Wisconsin Department of Transportation is asking the Legislature’s Joint Finance Committee to send more money to local governments to help them pay for road work and maintenance activities over the Winter.

Let’s back up and mention what type of expenses we are talking about, courtesy of the Legislative Fiscal Bureau.

The Department requests a one-time appropriation supplement of $23,526,300 SEG in 2026-27 in the routine maintenance activities appropriation, due to higher than anticipated costs associated with counties responding to 2025-26 winter conditions. The Department indicates that frequent snow events in the early winter season and a record winter storm in parts of the state in mid-March required county crews to incur costs significantly in excess of budgeted amounts. Based on the nine-year winter cost average, the Department had budgeted $57.6 million in county work for the 2025-26 winter season. Actual winter costs exceeded the amount budgeted by $22,595,179.

In other words, it cost more than $80 million this winter for counties to do everyday maintenance and snow plowing and other types of work on state highways this winter.

By the way, WisDOT already sets aside $10 million for extra costs that maybe needed due to excessive winter needs for work on the highway. But we are already above and beyond that amount, and that’s before we find out what happens here during an El Nino winter that likely will raise temperatures but also raise water in the atmosphere, which could mean more 30-degree heavy snowfalls instead of 20-degree colder and drier days.

On top of the higher costs for regular maintenance, the Winter packed an extra punch for a few specific counties in Center and Northern Wisconsin.

In addition to higher winter maintenance costs, five counties (Lincoln, Marathon, Marquette Oneida, and Price) incurred a total of $931,051 in higher than expected costs due to damage to segments of the state highway system caused by rapid freeze/thaw events and severe weather conditions. The Department has requested an appropriation supplement of this amount in the SEG appropriation for routine maintenance activities to allow it to reimburse the five counties for the higher costs.

Needless to say, those higher costs are going to squeeze out local street repairs and road buildings if these state funds don’t come in. And WisDOT indicates that it’ll make state highways significantly worse for the next several months if more money isn't set aside.

The Department indicates that a failure to approve the request would require it to instruct counties to defer routine maintenance and perform only safety-related maintenance activities for the remainder of counties' calendar year 2026 fiscal year. Routine maintenance includes activities such as minor surface and base repair, mowing and weed control, shoulder grading and repair, minor bridge repair, debris and accident cleanup, and repair of damaged traffic signs. The Department indicates that deferring routine maintenance would likely result in accelerated pavement deterioration, increased future rehabilitation costs, and reduced roadway safety. The Department also indicates that deferring routine maintenance would likely make it difficult for county highway departments to maintain the workforces needed to maintain the state highway system.

However, the LFB mentions that there may be a bailout for these extra highway maintenance costs, as the state has asked for federal funding from other states that failed to commit all the funds from previous years, known as “redistribution” funds. This happens in almost every year, Wisconsin got $230 million back under this program last year, and $150 million of redistribution funds are baked into the state budget for this year.

The 2026 redistribution numbers just dropped on Thursday, with Wisconsin getting $180 million of those funds. LFB says that since we got more than $150 million of the unused funds for this year, that could be an option to help pay for the added weather-related costs.

If the Department receives $173,526,300 or more in federal redistribution funds, the $23,526,300 in excess of the $150.0 million in existing FED expenditure authority could instead be used to fund the supplemental request. The Committee could authorize the Department to transfer up to $23,526,300 in 2026-27 from the SHR {State Highway Rehabilitation] SEG appropriation to the routine maintenance activities appropriation to address the winter maintenance funding shortfall. The Department could then use up to $23,526,300 in federal redistribution funds it plans to allocate to the SHR FED appropriation in 2026-27 to replace the SEG transferred to the routine maintenance activities appropriation. Under this alternative, in the event that DOT receives less than $23,526,300 in federal redistribution funds, DOT would be allowed to transfer the amount of federal redistribution funds in excess of the $150.0 million in existing FED expenditure authority from the SHR SEG appropriation to the routine maintenance appropriation. DOT would then be allowed to transfer from the transportation fund balance to the routine maintenance appropriation an amount equal to the difference between $23,526,300 and the amount of federal redistribution funds in excess of the $150.0 million in existing FED expenditure authority. For example, under this alternative, if the Department were to receive only $165.0 million in federal redistribution funds from FHWA, the Department could transfer $15,000,000 in federal redistribution funds from the SHR SEG appropriation to the routine maintenance appropriation. DOT would then be authorized to transfer $8,526,300 from the transportation fund balance to the routine maintenance appropriation to fully-fund the Department's request.

OK, maybe that’s the way around it and we get by for this winter without further depleting the state’s Transportation Fund.

But there’s no question that increased severe weather events and higher costs of regular road work are combining to make repairs from those events cost more than ever. And we are going to have to adjust to and pay for these one way or the other.