The Bush Administration’s welfare reform proposal, unveiled Feb. 26, reflects several policy recommendations made by NACo’s Welfare Reform Task Force. Many of the similarities can be found in the area of increased flexibility. These include:
• The definition of “assistance” is being clarified to say that child care and other support services will not be defined as “assistance” for individuals who are unemployed. This means that support services received under TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families) will not count toward the five-year limit.
• The president’s proposal would allow carryover funds from previous years to be spent on any activity allowed by TANF, and these funds will be considered “obligated” for the future. Under current Office of Management and Budget interpretation, carryover funds are considered unspent and can only be spent on assistance.
• Under current law, 90 percent of two-parent families and 50 percent of single-parent families must be participating in work activities. NACo policy supports equal treatment of two-parent and single-parent families. The president’s proposal splits the difference and makes the participation rate 70 percent for both.
• Under current law, activities such as substance abuse treatment are not considered allowable activities to meet the work requirements. NACo’s recommendations would make substance abuse treatment allowable activities. The president’s proposal would allow three consecutive months of substance abuse treatment in a two-year period to count toward meeting the 40-hour requirement. Additionally, states would have greater flexibility in allowing counseling and other ongoing activities to count toward part of the 40-hour requirement.
• The president’s proposal would allow states to apply for waivers to facilitate integration of several programs, consistent with NACo’s task force recommendations. These programs include TANF, food stamps, workforce investment, housing, high school equivalency and post-secondary education and employment services.
Differences in recommendations/proposals
There are, however, some differences, particularly in the areas of program funding and benefits to immigrants.
• The president’s proposal would fund the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) Block Grant at the current level of $16.6 billion. NACo policy would add an inflation increase.
• The proposal would fund child care programs at the current level of $4.8 billion. NACo task force recommendations call for increased funding to meet the needs of eligible families but do not specify an amount. It should be noted, however, that the Administration’s proposal would increase the hours of work required of TANF recipients from 30 to 40, which will create a greater demand for child care services.
• The Social Services Block Grant (SSBG) funding proposal also differs from NACo’s recommendations. NACo supports increasing SSBG to $2.8 billion and maintaining the 10 percent transfer authority from TANF to SSBG. These provisions were in the 1996 law but were subsequently reduced to pay for the Transportation Equity Act.
The program is currently funded at $1.7 billion, and the transfer rate is scheduled to be reduced to 4.25 percent next year. The president’s proposal would keep SSBG at the current level of funding and restore the full transfer authority.
• The president’s proposal would not restore benefits to legal immigrants, except for a proposal that would allow new immigrants to be eligible for food stamps after five years.
This proposal was made in the president’s budget and has been incorporated into the Senate farm bill. NACo supports restoring Medicaid and food stamps eligibility to all legal immigrants regardless of their date of entry and giving states the option to include new legal immigrants in the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP). Under current law, immigrants who arrived in the country after Aug. 22, 1996 must wait five years to qualify for Medicaid and CHIP.
The 1996 law also removed legal immigrants from the food stamp program, but some benefits have since been restored. The five-year wait for Medicaid eligibility is a particular hardship to counties because it increases incidence of uncompensated care in county hospitals.
Work requirements
Some of the provisions in the president’s proposal that have received the most attention have to do with work requirements. The Administration proposes increasing the work requirement from 30 hours to 40 hours a week. Additionally, 24 of those hours would have to be devoted to very specific work activities, which include unsubsidized employment, subsidized private and public sector employment, on-the-job training, supervised work experience and supervised community service. For teen parents, attending school would count toward meeting the 24-hour work requirement. States would have substantial flexibility in designating the activities that would qualify for the remaining 16 hours.
