State officials looking for cases of fraud in a child-care subsidy program are investigating 15 providers getting paid by the state to watch school-age children nearly full time, saying they'll likely suspend payments to at least one of the centers as a result.

The child-care centers are authorized through the Wisconsin Shares program to watch large numbers of children, who are already supposed to be in school all day, for more than 35 hours a week - raising questions about whether the children are really receiving the care, the officials said.

"It could be (a legitimate) after-school program where parents are working late, or it could be an easy way to be perpetrating fraud," said Children and Families deputy secretary Henry Wilde. "This is one where if we see high numbers, we want to go out and look at these providers."

Stung by revelations by media and state auditors of fraud by child-care centers in the more than $350 million subsidy program, the agency is combing its databases for "red flags," Wilde said.

The department already has suspended payments to 99 suspicious providers, including at least two in Dane County. State officials didn't provide the names of the 15 additional child-care providers now under investigation or say where they are based. The vast majority of suspended providers so far are in Milwaukee County.

Wilde said that red flags now drawing attention range from high numbers of school-age children receiving full-time care to a provider's past record of crimes or improper public aid payments. Providers with several warning signs are being investigated by the state, counties and local law enforcement.

Several red flags

One example of a provider with several red flags is Lashunta Allen of Milwaukee, who has had her state licenses revoked and Wisconsin Shares payments suspended.

Allen, who said she has been unfairly singled out, has a criminal record that includes a 2002 felony conviction for intentionally taking and carrying away merchandise and a misdemeanor conviction for retail theft. The Department of Children and Families said she also owes the state $1,968 because of money she should not have received for child care for her own children.

One other factor drawing the department's attention to Allen is the amount she was paid, Wilde said. Providers receiving more than $11,000 a year in state payments per licensed slot are receiving scrutiny because, to earn at that level, they likely have to run two child-care shifts, both day and night, he said.

Allen was receiving $16,615 a year in Wisconsin Shares payments for every slot for a child that she was licensed to care for at the first of her two child-care centers, Children and Families spokeswoman Erika Monroe-Kane said. At the other, she was receiving $13,359 in state subsidy payments for each licensed slot.

In an interview, Allen confirmed the convictions but said the payments state officials are calling suspicious are legitimate. She said she earned the high payments by running her centers from 6 a.m. to midnight seven days a week.

"I did things in the past, and I made up for the things I did in the past," said Allen, adding she had been up front about her past convictions. "I have never documented that kids were here if they're not here."

Allen said she had appealed the state's decision to suspend her payments, something that at least 42 of the 99 other suspended providers have done. Monroe-Kane said that the department has reinstated payments to four providers who have appealed.

Monroe-Kane said Allen's case had been referred to law enforcement. Allen said she was unaware of that and had not been contacted by police.

In play is a substantial amount of money for both Allen and taxpayers. Between November 2008 and September 2009, Allen received nearly $186,000 through the Shares program, according to figures provided by Monroe-Kane.

Bill has new teeth

State lawmakers also have been pursuing new tools in hopes of rooting out fraud in the system. On Thursday, lawmakers passed a bill supported by Gov. Jim Doyle that would require much more frequent checks of child-care providers' criminal records. The bill would permanently forbid providers convicted of certain serious crimes from being licensed, ending the current possibility for them to show they have been rehabilitated.

The state budget bill passed in June also allowed state child-care licensers to consider business-related crimes such as theft for the first time, Wilde said. That has given the department a new ability to revoke or deny licenses to providers considered at risk of defrauding the state, he said.

"Prior to that, all crimes were looked at through the lens of: Does this endanger a child? Is the crime substantially related to the care of children?" Wilde said.

Budget committee member Rep. Robin Vos, R-Caledonia, said he supported such actions but said the state agency and the democrat-controlled legislature need to do more. For example, he said, counties should be able to keep some of the money in fraudulent payments that they discover, giving them an incentive to catch fraud.

Bob Jacobson, a spokesman for the Wisconsin Council on Children and Families, said the news of suspicious providers shouldn't call into question an entire program that he said was key to helping poor parents with children afford to hold a job.

"It's still a tiny fraction of the caseload of providers," Jacobson said.

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