KEY SENATE DEMOCRATS, REPUBLICANS CHAMPION PROGRESSIVE WELFARE POLICY

Senator Kennedy Releases Letter To Finance Committee Urging Inclusion Of Important Poverty Reduction Measures

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today at Capitol Hill press conference, Senator Edward Kennedy (D-MA), Paul Wellstone (D-MN) and other Senate Democrats released a letter to the Senate Finance Committee outlining principles for Chairman Baucus (D-MT) to consider as he prepares to markup the welfare reform reauthorization bill. Separately, Senators Olympia Snowe and Max Baucus introduced legislation yesterday modeled on Maine's "Parents as Scholars" program to allow education to count as a work activity. Deepak Bhargava, Director of the National Campaign for Jobs and Income Support and Chief Organizer of the Make TANF Work! campaign reacted to the developments:

"House Republicans pushed through an extreme, unworkable welfare reauthorization bill on a party line vote. But as one Member recently said, 'fortunately, there is a Senate.'

Leadership on welfare policy, exhibited today by Senators Kennedy, Wellstone, Murray, Reed, Bingaman and others and recently by Senators backing the 'tri-partisan' Breaux-Hatch principles, represents a positive fresh start. Senator Snowe's education bill also signals that support for poor families crosses party lines. The Senate has shown its commitment to progressive welfare policy and begun the policy debate in a way that aims to make poverty reduction, not workfare at all costs, the focus of welfare reform reauthorization.

Today, we're honored to stand with one of the Senate's legendary legislators, in support of principles that count education and training as work, demand work stops the clock for families playing by the rules, fully restores benefits to immigrants and offers public jobs, more money for child care and protections for parents with sick and disabled kids help for parents with infants.

These principles should provide a guide for the Senate Finance Committee to produce a reauthorization bill that offers real hope for a way out of poverty."

The National Campaign for Jobs and Income Support (NCJIS), a project of the Center for Community Change, is a coalition of more than 1000 grassroots anti-poverty groups that has been organizing since 2000 to transform TANF into a meaningful anti-poverty program. Under the banner Make TANF Work! (http://www.maketanfwork.org/), the National Campaign is spearheading a national effort to fashion a progressive policy and political strategy on welfare reform.

Back

National Campaign for Jobs and Income Support
1000 Wisconsin Ave, NW
Washington, DC 20007
(202) 339-9328
info@nationalcampaign.org