Illegals escape subsidy scrutiny

The Washington Times ^ | 5 April2004 | S.A. Miller

[Jimmy Valentine's brother]

Arlington and Montgomery counties are the only local jurisdictions that do not check the immigration status of applicants for local housing subsidies, allowing illegal aliens to receive taxpayer-funded rent assistance.

Montgomery County spends about $3.7 million a year on rent assistance for 1,600 households, and Arlington County spends about $2.4 million a year on housing grants for 680 households.

[Jimmy Valentine's brother]

But agencies that use state or county funds to pay housing subsidies make their own rules, and jurisdictions like Montgomery and Arlington counties opt not to use the database.

I'd like to see the acounting on that. I'm sure it would make KPMG blush.

Immigration rights activists say that barring illegal aliens from housing-subsidy programs deprives residents of basic human rights and threatens to break up families.

What can I say?

JUST DAMN

[Jimmy Valentine's brother]

How's your housing search going? Think you could get some stinking subsidies?

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[goldstategop]

Of course liberals could less if it keeps eligible American families on a waiting list indefinitely.

[Paleo Conservative]

"If you say that you are a citizen, then we don't check," said Nancy Fink, who manages the rental-assistance program for the county's Department of Health and Human Services.

They've got it bass ackwards. They should ask, and if they misrepresent themselves as citizens, they should be handed over to the INS to be deported.

[Jimmy Valentine's brother]

To paraphrase the final words in Chinatown"Forget about Paleo, it's Mongomery County.

The Montgomery County Excecutive, Doug Duncan, is the one who told the county LEO's that illegals were not their problem and that the need not contact the INS. It's only when they start shooting the citizens and TV time is availble that illegals become a county LEO problem.

[AppyPappy]

You've got it all wrong. The illegals are taking government money that legal Americans won't take.

[Jimmy Valentine's brother]

Pinging fellow sufferers in Monty Conty.

Don’t forget April 15th; illegals need your money for their rights.

[tgslTakoma]

Montgomery County, however, relies on applicants to voluntarily disclose whether they are legal residents.

"If you say that you are a citizen, then we don't check," said Nancy Fink, who manages the rental-assistance program for the county's Department of Health and Human Services.

"If anything ever came to light, we will then go to them and ask them to provide [documentation]," she said. "We do everything possible to make sure that everything is on the up and up."

No, Ms. Fink; because you do not check their immigrant status as part of the application process, you DO NOT "do everything possible to make sure that everything is on the up and up."

This woman, and all who mis-administer the program, should be summarily fired.

[tgslTakoma]

How's your housing search going? Think you could get some stinking subsidies?

There's plenty of places out there for rent, for more $$ than the local Econo Lodge would cost me per month. No way would I qualify for a subsidy though, I'm a US citizen.

I'm still hunting for a place; got nine weeks to go. The sales market around here is absolutely INSANE, so I just gave up on that.

I did notice when we were in Fayetteville a few weeks ago, that I CAN afford to live there.

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

How's your housing search going? Think you could get some stinking subsidies?

I'm sure it would help if she got a tan, learned to speak Spanish, and worked for a landscaping company.

[judgeandjury]

"Denying the right to have housing just because of immigration status harms the entire community," said Betty Canton-Self, executive director of the San Francisco-based Interfaith Coalition for Immigrant Rights. "It harms family stability and harms values of our communities."

Betty has the unique ability to make it sound like she's saying something of substance, but after reviewing what she has said, you realize that there really is no substance to what she has said.