Sad.

But, there's one thing you can count on.  Go by at 10 / 11pm at night, and every light in the building is on - and the parking lot is empty!

Quoted from 147

Sad.

But, there's one thing you can count on.  Go by at 10 / 11pm at night, and every light in the building is on - and the parking lot is empty!

In situations similar to this one, and since the new DSS building can't handle it's current influx of people, they should consider going right to the hospital or the people's homes for the information. Or maybe the hospital's social workers can do this information gathering. This system that is presently in place is not working.

I am lead to believe that when people have appointments at DSS, they get there very early for a parking spot and a place in line "outside" of the building.

Quoted from 147

Sad.

But, there's one thing you can count on.  Go by at 10 / 11pm at night, and every light in the building is on - and the parking lot is empty!

  Wow! More working together works! See, belt tightening is for you sheeple, never County government.

     Joanne is right. About time intake workers and investigators were out in the field not chained to their desk. They are supposed to do "at homes" for the immobile-like your friend. Every new welfare case should have the household checked to make sure they actually live in this County. This is not happening. The fact that people have to line up in the cold outside the building is a sad commentary.  

These are government (county) employees, right? And the DSS building can't handle the amount of people that require this service, right? Than they should seperate departments, and for those who need nursing home assistance, those 'government empoyees' should get out from behind their desks and go right to the hospital or to the person's home. And most of the info they need are already in the system, be it social security, home ownership, army discharge papers, income tax returns. The government 'already' has this info. Why do they put the elderly's family through this when they (the government) already has access to this info?

Schenectady's DSS system is a nightmare!!!! Not to mention that some people that have gone down there have said that the DSS employees are nasty in the way they treat the people.

That was probably a 'strategic move' for the county/city......NIMBY......

They should be unchained from their desks and pound the pavement and explain to folks their future by only relying on the government.......

Quoted from bumblethru

These are government (county) employees, right? And the DSS building can't handle the amount of people that require this service, right? Than they should seperate departments, and for those who need nursing home assistance, those 'government empoyees' should get out from behind their desks and go right to the hospital or to the person's home. And most of the info they need are already in the system, be it social security, home ownership, army discharge papers, income tax returns. The government 'already' has this info. Why do they put the elderly's family through this when they (the government) already has access to this info?

Schenectady's DSS system is a nightmare!!!! Not to mention that some people that have gone down there have said that the DSS employees are nasty in the way they treat the people.

[b][/b]Well  it is easy to sit at home to critizize how they treat some of those people....They have some real scumbags they deal with....i give them alot of credit..IMHO    

Quoted from B GAGE

Well  it is easy to sit at home to critizize how they treat some of those people....They have some real scumbags they deal with....i give them alot of credit..IMHO

You are right and so is Bumble. But my mom's friend is not a scumbag. The elderly gentleman she was seeking assistance for is also not a scumbag. And I do know what they have to deal with everyday. My cousin works there.

Just like any other work place they have good and bad people there plus the AVERAGE dss client as they call 'em, is a grubbing lowlife. It's too bad they don't have a different building for the seniors and truly crippled people, then the one they have for the able bodied lazy, low class idiots who just don't want to work, but want to drink and drug all day. Anyone who is elderly and needs nursing home care through medicaid should not have to even be in the same room with the bums who would stink up that place with the 'gimme gimme' atittude.

The problem is that we have been transformed from an industrial center to a drug, alcohol and welfare center. The word is out Downstate to go to Schenectady County because they don't check anything and its easy the open a welfare case up there. Graham is right but an invalid or elderly should have an "at home" with the DSS worker.

Quoted from JoAnn

You are right and so is Bumble. But my mom's friend is not a scumbag. The elderly gentleman she was seeking assistance for is also not a scumbag. And I do know what they have to deal with everyday. My cousin works there.

Well Joann  i did not say  every person that goes in there is a scumbag......

Alot of those folks 'situations' have been deregulated back in the 80's......there TRULY are folks who just cant go from A-Z and make it work out....
being educated I am finding it very hard to make it work from A-Z in NYS......atleast my task master has a soft whip right now......
still cant find the straw for my bricks....they're coming slow and falling apart.....I would leave NYS before entering NYS DSS........

Quoted Text

SCHENECTADY
Long lines confront jobless at One Stop
Huge demand for county services
BY KATHLEEN MOORE Gazette Reporter

    The waiting starts before 8 a.m.
    Some in the crowd no longer make enough money to eat. Others are making no money at all, their jobs lost in the recession. A few come sporting injuries, leaning on crutches, unable to pay for medicine or surgery. All are hoping that they can get help at Schenectady County’s new One Stop Employment and Training Center.
    They wait outside, stare at the ground. No one speaks.
    At 8:10 a.m., a security guard opens the first door and the crowd surges forward. One by one, they’re filtered into a line that snakes in front of the metal detector. One by one, they take off their belts, empty their pockets and open their coats. One by one, they’re allowed into the next room.
    They wait again.
    At 8:30 a.m., the clerks behind the numbered windows call their fi rst clients and hand over paperwork. Lines stretch from the windows to the other end of the room.
    The lucky early ones receive a clipboard and a place to sit. With the crowd around them, they work on the forms, some unable to read well enough to understand the questions. A few don’t speak English. None ask the strangers next to them for help.
    This is the face of the new One Stop, a renovated building on Broadway that houses all of the county’s programs for unemployed, impoverished or disabled residents. Two months ago, the county consolidated three Department of Social Services buildings into the One Stop, meeting a federal goal of giving residents one place to access all needed services as well as a county goal of streamlining a program that was once spread throughout the city.
    Much of the plan has worked well. Unlike the agency’s former Nott Street building, this one is handicapped-accessible, allowing the disabled the same level of privacy as everyone else. In the past, some had to meet with counselors on the street to answer deeply personal, mandatory questions to get food stamps and other assistance.
    Residents also used to complain that the county’s buildings were decrepit, dirty, small and too far apart. Those who needed both job help and child support had to walk a mile from one building to the next. Now they can access everything from one room.
HUGE DEMANDS
    But when all the programs were consolidated, not everything went smoothly.
    Residents wait hours — and sometimes more than half a day — in lines that stretch to the door. The room holds more than 100 people and is filled from early morning until late afternoon. When the clerks announce that they cannot take any more people, dozens are sent home to try again another day.
    Making matters worse, the state has changed many rules intended to make it easier to apply for food stamps and Medicaid. Counselors are still learning the new rules as they try to speed up the lines.
    After a few weeks of confusion, One Stop workers now give out calendars detailing their workshops on resume building, interview prep and online classes.
    Unfortunately, that has just emphasized how much longer job seekers must wait.
    Most of the people interviewed said they were able to reach the job center within one hour on their first visit — but then many discovered they had to wait days before they could get the help they needed.
    Resume preparation is held just twice a week. Counselors run a workshop on interviewing techniques only once every two weeks.
    There isn’t enough space or counselors to run those events more often, said DSS Commissioner Dennis J. Packard, who has only been in charge of the job-seeking portion of the One Stop for a year. The county consolidated all job-related programming under his purview to save money and prepare for the One Stop.
    That combined welfare-towork candidates with white-collar workers who just got laid off. Both need very different services, and the One Stop just can’t do it all at once. Schenectady County’s jobless rate hit 7.8 percent in February — 6,000 without work — up from 7.1 percent in January.
    Some job seekers end up leaving the job center almost immediately, believing they can do nothing until the next workshop. They don’t realize that if they are willing to wait, counselors can give them one-on-one help that is just as thorough as the workshops.
    Packard defended the lack of personal attention.
    “You walk a fine line when you talk to people. Sometimes you want to let them explore on their own, build their own experience, rather than force-feed them,” he said.
    But for those who want to know everything at once, clerks are giving out handbooks that explain everything they have to offer.
    Packard is also now setting up a Web page specifically for job seekers, duplicating most of the resources offered at the One Stop job center. The calendar, hiring events, links to jobs, civil service test announcements and other information will all be placed online.
    “We’re going to get it out there,” he said.
SPEED AND EFFICIENCY
    Packard is also trying to speed up the lines for those seeking other help, particularly food stamps and Medicaid.
    In interviews with dozens of those visitors, the average time to complete their business was three hours. Only a few said they were able to leave in less than an hour.
    Part of the delay is that they must have a face-to-face interview with a food stamps counselor and then wait to do it again with a Medicaid counselor, Packard said. Soon those interviews will be combined into one.
    Those lines are also longer because Packard has fewer counselors available — not because of a lack of workers but because they are training in the new state rules for food stamps and Medicaid.
    “There’s a lot of changes going in, Medicaid and food stamps in particular,” Packard said. “Here’s the two-edged sword: You want your staff to be trained, but when I have to send people it means they’re not here to do the work.”
    But the delay also comes from the paperwork that must be filled out before visitors can leave the waiting room. They often don’t bring all the information they need, forcing them to come back and wait again with their completed applications.
    Those looking for work, for example, are asked to fill out a resume detailing every job they’ve had, including street addresses and phone numbers. Others must bring boxes of old bank statements to prove that they never squirreled away extra money to make themselves seem eligible for Medicaid.
    When they reach the front of their lines with completed paperwork, they are ushered into state-of-the-art interview cubicles where they can provide personal information in relative privacy — a distinct improvement over the arrangement at the previous buildings.
    “The building is better than what it was before,” said Darnell Clark after hours spent waiting. “But no one wants to sit there all day.”
    One woman was sent home twice after hours in line because the caseworkers knew they wouldn’t be able to get to her before the end of the day.
    The dreaded afternoon announcement — “We will not be able to serve anyone else today” — is greeted with screams of rage from some who have waited for hours. Others just slouch out the door, silent.
    “I’ve been told to come back so many times,” said Paula Tillman. “And I was homeless and sick. I need Medicaid. The lines are just terrible.”
GET IN LINE
    Even simple tasks, such as copying resumes, start with a line.
    “I had to wait 30 minutes to make copies of two pages,” said a woman who wanted to be identified only as T.P. “I have to come back every day [to meet welfare requirements], and they have you wait in line all day long. This is too much.”
    Clark said he thinks the lines are getting faster.
    “They’re definitely trying,” he said. “It’s going in the right direction, but they’ve got to make it easier. People have lives.”
    In particular, people need to get to job interviews — or actual jobs — as well as reducing, as much as possible, their child care costs. Many simply bring their children along rather than pay someone to watch them.
    Contessa Cooley found a baby sitter to take care of her children while she went to the One Stop to apply for day care funding last week. She walked for 90 minutes to get there.
    “I live way up State,” she said. “If I don’t have a way, I have to walk.”
    She was relieved to finally get her paperwork and leave the building after a three-hour wait.
    “I had a migraine from somebody’s child just screaming,” she said. “He wanted to play and couldn’t do it because the floor’s so dirty.”
    Cooley was one of several people who said the One Stop should add a play area to the already-crowded waiting room.
    But Packard said there simply...........http://www.dailygazette.net/De.....amp;EntityId=Ar00102

Quoted Text

CAPITAL REGION
Demand for benefi ts grows amid recession
More applying for assistance programs
BY MICHAEL LAMENDOLA Gazette Reporter

    Mirroring a nationwide trend, the number of people receiving welfare benefits in the Capital Region is increasing monthly as the economy continues its recession, according to local departments of social services.
    The federal government reported Thursday that a record 32.2 million people — one in every 10 Americans — have received food stamps.
    Schenectady, Albany and Saratoga counties all reported increased case loads for people receiving food stamps and other safety net assistance.
    Schenectady County’s food stamp case load went from 6,286 in December to 6,383 in January, while its case load for temporary and safety net assistance went from 1,129 in December to 1,145 in January.
    “This increase continues the trend we’ve seen since end of 2007 into 2008,” said county spokesman Joe McQueen. The county is also processing 50 to 75 more applications per month than it did this time last year, he said.
    “The increase does seem to begin the end of 2007 and early 2008, so there likely is a connection to the recession, but we do not have any specific information or data to prove this,” McQueen said.
    Food stamps are the major U.S. antihunger program and help poorer people buy groceries. The average benefit was $112 per person in January. It will increase this month by about $80 a month for a household of four under federal stimulus legislation President Barack Obama signed.
    Family assistance is the federal program for families with children younger than 18 and is provided for 60 months. Safety net assistance is the state program that includes individuals, childless couples and families that have exhausted their 60 months of family assistance.
    Albany County saw its temporary/safety net assistance and food stamp case loads increase from 13,225 in January to 13,464 in February, said spokeswoman Mary Duryea.
    Compared to a year ago, the numbers are up 10 percent for temporary assistance and nearly 20 percent for food stamp assistance, Duryea said. “We are also seeing more households who had never had to apply but who applying now,” she said.
    In Saratoga County, case loads increased 21 percent for food stamps and 13 percent for temporary and safety net assistance over the past year, said Social Services Commissioner Robert Christopher.
    The nation is experiencing the 16th straight month of an economic downturn that has.............http://www.dailygazette.net/De.....amp;EntityId=Ar01102