EDITORIALS When will N.Y. raise its welfare grant?
A new study of economic hardship in the nation’s suburbs and cities by the Rockefeller Institute of Government in Albany found, not surprisingly, that some of the severest poverty is found in the cities of the Midwest and Northeast. There are many reasons for this, but one of them is the inadequacy of welfare payments. That’s especially true in New York state, where the cash grant has not been raised since 1990. It’s time. There have been big changes in the welfare system since the Welfare Reform Act of 1996. The reforms, which included lifetime benefi t limits, were designed to encourage people to work — not just healthy men, but women with children. To give states more flexibility to meet the needs of their poor, as well as incentive to reduce their welfare caseloads, the federal government switched its share of welfare assistance from a categorical grant to a block grant and eliminated the matching requirement. That meant if the states could move a lot of people off the rolls, they could keep the extra money and use it as they saw fit. And record numbers were removed from the rolls. Some states used the savings to increase the basic grant for the neediest, mostly children, who remained on welfare. If they didn’t actually increase the cash grant, they substantially increased other forms of assistance, such as shelter, food, transportation and child care. But New York’s social service spending as a share of state budget has fallen, for both cash and noncash assistance. The basic welfare grant remains where it was in 1990 — $291 for a family of three — while inflation has increased more than 60 percent since that time. The value of the grant is now less than 50 percent of the poverty level. And, increasingly, poor families are using it to pay for food and housing — and/or turning to food pantries and homeless shelters. The poor have an obligation to work if they can. But the state also has an obligation to give adequate assistance to those who can’t. Raise the grant.
I absolutely disagree with raising the grant for welfare recipients. And I don't care if the average welfare recipient is collecting a 'near poverty' welfare check or not. GET A JOB!!
If you have a disability there is SSI. If you work but fall into a low income level, apply for Section 8, apply for food stamps, apply for HEAP to pay for heat, apply for medicaid for health coverage or better yet, the government (taxpayers) will pay for you to go to school to get a better education so you can get a better job with a higher income earning. Religious organizations are also available for help. Not to mention Salvation Army and the City Mission.
And if you are a generational wefare recipient and are just plain lazy....then fend for yourself and don't expect me to foot your bill!
When the INSANE are running the ASYLUM In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule. -- Friedrich Nietzsche
“How fortunate for those in power that people never think.” Adolph Hitler
Again,,,,let Planned Parenthood and their false advertising via their namesake foot the bill.......they certainly dont 'provide' the knowledge necessary to plan and execute a 'choice' and neither do the schools and mandated sex education......it doesn't cost alot to take care of ones self, but add to yourself via 'choices' and the expense just rockets and so does greed, covetousness, bigotry, racism etc(via society's view at the time)........
...you are a product of your environment, your environment is a product of your priorities, your priorities are a product of you......
The replacement of morality and conscience with law produces a deadly paradox.
STOP BEING GOOD DEMOCRATS---STOP BEING GOOD REPUBLICANS--START BEING GOOD AMERICANS
State must start to help poor by raising basic welfare grant
My family had a wonderful Thanksgiving. The immediate family — including my first grandchild — gathered in harmony with plenty of delicious food and good memories to share. Other folks in the community made sure that those less fortunate had a good meal or were able to collect a Thanksgiving basket to prepare their own feast. But when I took a few moments to relax from my own personal schedule, I read a number of disturbing articles in the papers, even during the holidays! There were stories such as that the richest states (including New York) shortchanged their poorest children; that the New York state welfare grant allocation has not been raised since 1990; that food pantries across the region see an enormous increase in demand — 40 to 50 percent, etc. Locally, the Schenectady Inner City Ministry food pantry has seen a similar increase of visits by people in need. Since its relocation to the new site on Albany Street, the pantry has experienced a tremendous increase in visits by many new families. Apart from being in a more accessible location for those most in need, the lack of adjustments to the state welfare grants certainly explains the increased demand on this and other pantries. While it is very important, even life-saving, to offer these services to the poor in our communities, it is even more important to work toward policy changes at all government levels to adequately maintain a safety net for people in need. One helpful step in that direction will require an urgent increase in the state’s welfare grant to people on public assistance, along with better employment opportunities and training and more secure health care benefits. Please call on your public officials to urge them to promote increases in welfare benefits, along with other economic opportunities. HELGA A. SCHROETER Schenectady The writer is president of the steering committee for the Schenectady Inner City Ministry.
How about just finding them jobs and make them go to work instead of just handing them the taxpayers hard earned money. Like the old proverb says, give a man a fish he will eat today, teach him to fish and he can feed himself forever or something like that.
ALOT of folks we live around/with are mentally disabled and have difficulty 'fitting in' with the systems.....however, I find this discussion amusing considering there are other mentally disabled folks who get tittlated via legal avenues with adult stores, strip clubs, penthouse etc.....and with issues of child porn and other 'sex offenders'.........
hippocracy at it's best.....THE PENIS CONTINUES TO RULE AND THE GIRLS/WOMEN KEEP FEEDING IT......(not to say the girl private doesn't get involved with sex offenses)
let's see what has more weight in society....money or sex.......???????
I wont even discuss gambling and NYS lotto or NYRA......
...you are a product of your environment, your environment is a product of your priorities, your priorities are a product of you......
The replacement of morality and conscience with law produces a deadly paradox.
STOP BEING GOOD DEMOCRATS---STOP BEING GOOD REPUBLICANS--START BEING GOOD AMERICANS
They need to stop giving them CASH benefits. And the same goes for all those moms getting SSI checks for their kids with ants in their pants.
Give them the handout via plastic card, NEVER to receive "cold hard cash," but rather the card could be programmed to purchase clothing up to certain values (no $50 name brand sneakers), the paper products (toilet paper, kleenex, etc), household cleaners, personal hygiene and cleaning (but NOT makeup and nail polishes). It would be programmed to not be allowed for cigarettes, alcohol, nail salons, and jewelry. It could be programmed for a maximum of about $30 a month for phone service (no cell phones, and none of these optional features). It could be programmed to not be accepted at Time Warner nor any agents at which people can pay cable bills.
Make life on the dole miserable. There's no incentive to work when you can sit back all day watching TV, painting your fake salon fingernails, talking on your cell phone
Optimists close their eyes and pretend problems are non existent. Better to have open eyes, see the truths, acknowledge the negatives, and speak up for the people rather than the politicos and their rich cronies.
They dont get cash benefits---it is a card carrying system--and there is no nail polish alotment or the like....as for the cell phones---check the 'baby's daddy'........if we think this is an awful system the NYS politicians are welfare recipients too--just on the other end of the 'body' of society and not much cleaner(if at all).......
...you are a product of your environment, your environment is a product of your priorities, your priorities are a product of you......
The replacement of morality and conscience with law produces a deadly paradox.
STOP BEING GOOD DEMOCRATS---STOP BEING GOOD REPUBLICANS--START BEING GOOD AMERICANS
Don't forget another reason for no cash is they use the cash to buy drugs too.
I heard that in the past they actually sell these cards for drugs. I don't know if they have changed the process of using these card, making it harder for others to use them.
The welfare 'lifers' know how to work the system. Are there people out there REALLY in need? You bet there are. But they do not make a career out of it. Nor do they like being in the system. And they are in the minority. But then there are the majority who take full advantage of the system and work it well!!!!! It's throwing good tax money after bad!
When the INSANE are running the ASYLUM In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule. -- Friedrich Nietzsche
“How fortunate for those in power that people never think.” Adolph Hitler
First published: Sunday, January 13, 2008 It'll be easy enough to be confused, if not overwhelmed, with the state Legislature back in session and the special interests descending upon lawmakers peddling causes both noble and ignoble. There ought to be perhaps more pressure than ever to raise the pay of the state's judges for the first time in a decade. The judges themselves are making the very persuasive case one would expect of them. Then, again, it's a safe bet that the very legislators whose votes are needed to give those judges a raise will demand one for themselves as well -- lame as that argument is, at least until they can reform the Legislature first. But what about the poor, the people living on government subsides? State welfare benefits haven't been increased since 1990. What's known as the basic welfare grant for a family of three has been stuck all those years at $291 a month. A family of three on welfare also can get up to $426 a month in food stamps and a shelter allowance of a little more than $300 a month. The specific amount of the housing subsidy varies from county to county. It's unconscionable that the Legislature has gone this long without adjusting basic welfare benefits. Everyone is affected by inflation, of course, from judges and legislators to the poorest of the poor. That latter group, in fact, may well be hit all the harder since so much of the little money it has goes to the most basic of necessities. The price of milk, for instance, has gone up by 94 percent since 1990. The price of fuel oil and natural gas are about twice as high now than they were when the subsidy for home heating costs last was adjusted in 1987. In each case, that's much higher than the overall 55 percent increase in the rate of inflation since 1990. New York's courts, including the Court of Appeals, have ruled five times since 1987 that the welfare shelter allowance is illegally low. That requires welfare families to use part of their basic grant, scant as it is, to subsidize housing costs. Even now, more than a decade after rewritten welfare laws reduced the number of New Yorkers on public assistance by 61 percent, more than 535,000 people -- including more than 300,000 children -- live this way. They need the Legislature's attention as much as anyone. A cost of living adjustment in the basic welfare grant, to $475 a month for a family of three, is urgent. The Assembly, but not the Senate, voted for a 10 percent increase in the basic welfare grant last year. This year the Democrats in the Senate are pushing for a 25 percent increase. That money is readily available, too, despite the state's $4.3 billion budget deficit. Federal block grants pay for the state's welfare costs. Other states have used the block grant since 1996 to raise welfare benefits. New York, though, has invested it in so-called rainy day funds. And now it's raining, and raining hard, on the people who most need state government's help. THE ISSUE:The state's welfare grant hasn't be raised in years.THE STAKES:Without an increase, inflation will erode subsistence funds even more.
more than 535,000 people -- including more than 300,000 children
Even that amount of folks make less than the NYS legislature and truly is a drop in the bucket----IF those #'s are accurate......
Let me see---what has Hillary done for me lately,,,same thing I always expect her to do---nothing....and truly that is OK with me.....and currently, if ya look at the presidential hopefulls---they are a bunch of beggars......
...you are a product of your environment, your environment is a product of your priorities, your priorities are a product of you......
The replacement of morality and conscience with law produces a deadly paradox.
STOP BEING GOOD DEMOCRATS---STOP BEING GOOD REPUBLICANS--START BEING GOOD AMERICANS
Funny how these things are always written by the unnamed...
Quoted Text
The price of milk, for instance, has gone up by 94 percent since 1990. The price of fuel oil and natural gas are about twice as high now than they were when the subsidy for home heating costs last was adjusted in 1987. In each case, that's much higher than the overall 55 percent increase in the rate of inflation since 1990.
So, tell me this, whoever the person is who wrote this whole thing. If EVERYONE is dealing with these upticks in costs, how is it that some of us should be expected to pay our own AND SOMEBODY ELSES? You know, I realize it's difficult for the poor, but we're doingo our best to handle the same exact issues. They need to figure it out and come away from the trough.
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