America's Safety Net Under Attack
Published on Saturday, April 14, 2012 by
The Nation
America's Safety Net Under Attack
This Week in Poverty: Will Pennsylvania Rip Another Hole in the Safety Net?
by Greg Kaufmann
If youve never heard of state-funded General Assistance (GA) programs, youre hardly alone. A safety net of last resort for very poor peopleoften childless adultswho dont qualify for other forms of public assistance, there arent too many of them still in existence. Not too long ago most states offered them, but in recent decades they have been eliminated or severely restricted. Now, only thirty states maintain GA programs, and the benefit level for most falls below one-quarter of the poverty line, or less than $2,750 per year.
In a recent report for the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP), Liz Schott and Clare Cho call this trend especially troubling since a growing number of jobless and elderly are exhausting their unemployment benefits and continue to be unable to find work.
Poor, childless adults are becoming even more vulnerable to severe hardship than in the past and are doing so in greater numbers, write the authors.
One state that still maintains a GA program is Pennsylvania where 68,000 peopleor just about one in every 200 residentsreceive about $205 per month (five counties offer a little more, twenty-eight counties a little less). But when Republican Governor Tom Corbett released his budget in February he proposed eliminating the program entirely as of July 1. A final budget must be passed and signed by that date, and with Republican majorities in the House and Senate, legal aid lawyer Michael Froehlich of Community Legal Services in Philadelphia says, Its not looking good. ...............(more)
The complete piece is at:
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/04/14-3