Posted on 05/04/2009 10:45:29 PM PDT by dila813
Just as more families are turning to the government for help, Oregon leaders are considering budget cuts that would dismantle the state's welfare-to-work program.
To find billions to balance the next two-year budget, state leaders are considering cuts, including: eliminating cash assistance to families with two parents at home; reducing or eliminating state-paid day care while parents look for a job or start work; reducing payments that help people transition from welfare to full-time employment; and reducing or eliminating training and life skills programs designed to help people get and keep a job.
Here's a sample of possible cuts to the program:
-- Reduce payments to newly employed people transitioning off assistance. Affects: 3,119 families Saves: $5.7 million
-- Eliminate assistance to two-parent families. Affects: About 1,675 households Saves: $15.7 million
-- Reduce short-term "basic living" support to families waiting to qualify for cash assistance. Affects: 142 families a month Saves: $400,000
-- Reduce employment training, life skills, job-search assistance, alcohol and drug screenings and other job help. Saves: $10 million to $20 million
-- Reduce or eliminate day care subsidy for parents receiving cash assistance or who have very low incomes. Saves: $1.9 million to $41 million, depending on the timing and depth of the cut
Note: Savings are state general tax dollars and do not include federal matching funds.
The cuts would represent a retreat from reforms that began in 1996 when President Bill Clinton and Congress added deadlines and work requirements for parents receiving welfare benefits. Oregon adopted its own reforms in 2007 that were designed to prepare parents to get and keep a job.
The changes were supported by advocates for the poor because of the services they provide and by fiscal watchdogs because they would eventually move people off state support and into permanent jobs.
(Excerpt) Read more at oregonlive.com ...
This was the crown jewel of the Republican Congress and later Bush on Welfare Policy.
If you want assistance, you must work. We will help you but all assistance comes to an end.
This ended the cycle of generations on welfare, now it is being dismantled. Is this being done in other states too?
It looks like the era of big government and a population of people living off the government is soon to return.
Constantly, there is talk that a state government must spend to get matching funds for a project. Here is a case where there is additional funding that a state if passing over so their dollars can be spent for something else.
Bike paths in Eugene? See the unforeseen damage of the stimulus.
The damage is not unforeseen. The stimulus has tax bombs at the federal and state levels. Conservative governors have bitterly complained about the state tax bombs but the media has provided good cover for the rats. The stimulus has bribed states to spend recklessly while state budgets implode. We are living in a worst case scenario of a fiscal train wreck.
interesting, so this was purposeful.
I can see that is what is happening, the spending with no regard.
But haven’t caught up with the fact that it is purposeful, I thought it was just dumb inefficient government at its best.
More of a folly.
well the train wreck happens before november of 2010.
the political fallout will be interesting.
“even welfare”
Yeah, it’s one thing if it’s just jobs, incomes, productivity, and individual freedoms that are lost, but WELFARE? Please don’t let it hit the handouts!
It is a msm bias in the title, it is really about increasing and not decreasing welfare.
This is about more dismantling GOP wins of the past.
Currently, California offers payments fo children past the 36? month limitation on parental benefits. Oregon does not. As a CA border county with Oregon, we see a steady stream of welfare refugees coming into CA along I-5. These new changes would make a bad situation even worse.
Seems like they are pulling up the ladder that will actually help people get off welfare. Its probably cheaper to keep people dependent—for the short term anyway.
Maybe, but they are taking the money and spending it on other federal programs related to the stimulus, like light rail.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.