National Association of Counties * Washington, D.C.      Vol. 33, No. 23 * December 10, 2001

---

Previous story | Table of Contents | Next story

Welfare reform task force sets
benchmarks for new legislation

By Marilina Sanz
associate legislative director

---

NACo’s task force on the Next Steps of Welfare Reform, finished its work at the Workforce Development and Human Services Conference in Broward County, Fla. The 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act expires next year. Subsequently, the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families Block Grant (TANF), and its related programs such as the Child Care and Development Fund, the Social Services and Development Block Grant (SSBG), the Food Stamp Program and the Child Support Enforcement Program are up for reauthorization.

The task force recommendations cover seven major topics: funding and flexibility, families in poverty, child care, work and training, family formation, child well-being and coordination with other programs.

Some of the task force’s specific program recommendations include the following:

• maintaining the current federal TANF contribution of $16.8 billion and adding annual inflation increases
• providing sufficient child care funds to ensure that quality services are available to families with incomes of up to 225 percent of poverty and for families that leave TANF
• de-linking federal foster care eligibility from the 1996 Aid to Families with Dependent Children income eligibility standards and developing a new system that responds to a child’s risk of abuse
• restoring Medicaid and Food Stamps eligibility to legal immigrants
• restoring SSBG to at least the level authorized in the 1996 law of $2.8 billion in FY03
• continuing transitional Medicaid for at least 12 months and giving states added flexibility to cover families that lose their Medicaid eligibility including the option of a buy-in program
• allowing states and counties the option to provide more than 12 months of vocational education and to allow increased hours of basic skills and education training
• allowing employability plan requirements such as drug treatment activities to count as work activities
• providing equitable treatment for two-parent families by making the work participation rate and the number of hours required the same as for single parents
• providing incentives to states to pass-through a higher percentage of child support collections
• restoring the authority to transfer 10 percent of TANF to SSBG
• opposing carve-outs or set asides
• enhancing Supplemental Security Income outreach to ensure that all eligible individuals participating in the program, and
• enhancing other programs that help families achieve self-sufficiency such as the Earned Income Tax Credit, the Workforce Investment Act, affordable housing and welfare-to-work transportation services.

The task force’s recommendations have been submitted to the Human Services and Education Steering Committee as well as NACo’s Executive Committee. Final action on the recommendations will be taken at the legislative conference in March.

The Food Stamp program is on a slightly different track because it is part of the Farm Bill reauthorization Congress is considering right now. NACo adopted a comprehensive Food Stamp policy this summer, but the task force felt it was important to re-emphasize that policy because of the program’s importance to successful welfare reform.