12-07-2002
WELFARE: Welfare's Voices and Choices
This year's debate over welfare reauthorization never even approached the
tempestuous pitch of the 1996 welfare-reform effort. But this year's
discussion also failed to produce a final bill. Instead, Congress passed a
three-month extension of the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families
program before adjourning.
Still, Congress made progress on a surprising number of welfare
controversies this year. Expected flashpoints over marriage promotion and
overall funding levels never really materialized. Instead, the biggest
remaining disputes between the House and the Senate are over child care
funding levels and the rules governing who needs to engage in what
activities, for how many hours, to meet work-participation
requirements.
Advocates repeatedly singled out Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max
Baucus, D-Mont., and ranking member Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, for their
joint efforts on damping down potential storms this year. And they sound
hopeful that the two can continue their partnership through the actual
reauthorization. "There's something special that Senator Grassley and
Senator Baucus have built to make it abundantly clear that they can only
move forward through bipartisanship and consensus," says Elaine Ryan,
deputy executive director of the American Public Human Services
Association. "It's quite refreshing."
National Governors Association; National Conference of State Legislatures;
American Public Human Services Association
When the welfare overhaul handed primary responsibility for welfare to the
states, the powerhouse troika of the National Governors Association, the
National Conference of State Legislatures, and the American Public Human
Services Association banded together. Their members-the nation's
governors, state legislators, and human services administrators-were
suddenly responsible for creating, funding, and running the new
programs.
Through the reauthorization period, they've been marching in lockstep to
maintain their program flexibility and to try to increase funding for
child care. "We never leave home without each other," jokes
Elaine Ryan.
The state groups say they were surprised by the Bush proposal, adopted by
the House, to increase work-participation rates and hours and to narrow
the definition of work; they're going to push for more flexibility next
year. "We were prepared for discussions on marriage promotion and
family foundation, but we weren't prepared for a conversation on
increasing work-participation rates," said Sheri Steisel, the senior
committee director for NCSL's Human Services Committee. "From our
perspective, the bottom line is getting people into real jobs in the
private sector."
They are planning to argue that flexibility was a crucial part of welfare
reform's success. "One federal requirement on states may not fit
every state experience, especially during an economic downturn, where job
placements are getting more difficult," says Ryan. "We would
want to see the federal government set some broad goals on what an
increased work requirement would look like, and then let states figure out
how to get there."
The troika was bitterly disappointed when Congress adjourned without
delivering the certainty of either a reauthorization or a three-year
extension of the current program. TANF makes up a significant chunk of
state budgets, which are under more financial stress than they've suffered
in the last 50 years. Furthermore, 19 of the 50 states run on two-year
budget cycles, which means that, come January, they're stuck trying to
legislate a 24-month program with only three months of federal guidance.
"This is a top priority for state legislatures because it is such a
big part of our budgets," Steisel says.
Heritage Foundation
The conservative Heritage Foundation has assembled a powerhouse team that
favors President Bush's plan for stricter work requirements for welfare
recipients and a new marriage-promotion initiative, both adopted in the
House plan. As the debate heats up, expect the think tank's scholars to
barrage the media and Capitol Hill with reports on why the Bush plan is
best.
Jason Turner, who joined the foundation earlier this year, has a stellar
reputation in welfare circles. He helped design the Wisconsin welfare
reform plan that was a precursor to the 1996 federal reforms, and later he
guided New York City's program under then-Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani. In
congressional testimony last April, Turner argued that the stricter work
requirements Bush had proposed would encourage even more welfare
recipients to find stable jobs. Some states, he lamented, have used
flexibility in the 1996 law to exempt large numbers of their welfare
clients from work requirements.
Meanwhile, Heritage fellows Robert Rector and Patrick Fagan argued in an
October report that the Bush administration's $300 million plan to promote
marriage among welfare recipients would help reduce poverty. The Bush plan
and the House measure would fund state programs that encourage unmarried
couples with children to consider marriage, and counsel low-income married
couples to stay together. "Children born outside of marriage are
overwhelmingly more likely to live in poverty, depend on welfare, and have
behavior problems," Rector and Fagan wrote.
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
Democrats looking for ammunition during the coming battle over welfare
reauthorization will turn to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a
humble but prolific Washington think tank known for its sharp analysis and
media savvy.
The center's ace in the hole is Wendell Primus. An expert on welfare
policy, Primus joined the center in 1997 after resigning from his post as
deputy assistant secretary for human services policy at the Health and
Human Services Department to protest President Clinton's signing of the
1996 welfare reform legislation. Primus has teamed with colleague Sharon
Parrott, a former welfare administrator in the District of Columbia, on a
series of reports critiquing the Bush administration's proposal.
By increasing the number of hours welfare recipients must work and
limiting opportunities for work exemptions, the Bush plan would force a
one-size-fits-all approach on welfare recipients, Parrott and Primus
argue. They note that some states have achieved successes by tailoring
programs to individual needs, allowing some recipients to begin their
transition by pursuing drug rehabilitation, remedial education, or college
courses in lieu of work.
And the center's regular conference calls with reporters will ensure that
its critique reaches the public. In addition to Parrott and Primus, a
regular participant in the conference calls is Mark Greenberg, the
director of policy at the Center for Law and Social Policy, who is also
considered one of the most articulate critics of the Bush plan.
NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund
Although it was established in 1970 by the founders of the National
Organization for Women, the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund is a
separate organization that's been influential in the welfare
reauthorization debate. It seeks to protect women and pull them up out of
poverty, and its positions have frequently pitted the group against
Republicans in Congress. The NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund focuses
on child care, employment and education, immigrants' rights, reproductive
health, family privacy, and the prevention of violence against
women.
The fund created the Building Opportunities Bonus Coalition in 1999 to
activate grassroots organizations in an attempt to modify the 1996 welfare
act's high-performance bonus for states into a reward for the states that
best addressed the issues of child care, job training, and
domestic-violence prevention. BOB has since grown into a network of 300
local, state, and national groups representing women's-rights,
civil-rights, anti-poverty and anti-violence groups, and religious and
professional organizations. The coalition includes the YWCA of the USA,
the National Urban League, and the Child Care Action Campaign. Those
organizations employ many former welfare recipients and victims of
violence, who have brought their own moving stories to Washington.
BOB hosts monthly meetings in Washington, available by conference call to
local activists and the press, to consider issues ignored or overlooked in
the poverty debate. The NOW LDEF and BOB hold joint congressional
briefings and send e-mails to their grassroots members and the press with
updates and pleas for assistance in contacting members of
Congress.
Lisa Maatz, vice president for government relations at NOW LDEF, says that
NOW LDEF and BOB will work hard next year to recruit moderate Republicans
and Democrats to support their issues. Their job will be more difficult
because two of their top advocates in Congress-Sen. Paul Wellstone,
D-Minn., and Rep. Patsy Mink, D-Hawaii-recently died unexpectedly. In the
reauthorization battle, the groups will try to increase funding for child
care and to gain better access for people stuck on long day care waiting
lists. They will also fight the Bush administration's proposal to spend up
to $300 million in state and federal money to promote marriage among
welfare recipients. "Given the precious dollars we have, we want to
make sure they go to the programs that we know work," such as
education and training, said Maatz.
National Campaign for Jobs and Income Support
The National Campaign for Jobs and Income Support plans to continue a
strong grassroots push into 2003 in an attempt to secure increased funding
for education, training, transitional-jobs programs, and child care for
welfare recipients. The group's advocates also want Congress to restore to
legal immigrants some of the benefits that were taken away as part of the
1996 welfare act.
The campaign, under the direction of Deepak Bhargava, is an influential,
national anti-poverty organization with a strong grassroots presence. It
organizes very public, message-driven events. It has more than 200
organizations working in 43 states, including the Philadelphia
Unemployment Project, the Vermont Livable Wage Campaign, and the Chicago
Coalition for the Homeless. In March, more than 2,000 participants lobbied
members of Congress, and Baucus addressed the group.
The campaign opposes the welfare reauthorization bill the House passed
last year. The group won a few victories in the Senate Finance Committee
bill, including, Bhargava says, funding for training programs and
transitional-jobs programs, and for the restoration of some benefits to
legal immigrants. "What we've learned is that real change doesn't
come from Washington, but from the grassroots," he said. The
campaign's $2 million-a-year budget comes from individuals and
foundations, including the David and Lucile Packard Foundation.
Corine Hegland, Marilyn Werber Serafini, and Shawn Zeller
National Journal
