This article originally appeared in the May-June 2002 issue of the Children's Advocate, published by Action Alliance for Children.

A chance to change welfare

The federal welfare-reform law is up for renewal this year-and parents on welfare want a voice in changing it

By Jean Tepperman

"We're doing a lot of outreach to welfare offices, letting the recipients know they do have rights," says Yolanda James. A CalWORKs mom herself and a part-time staff member at the Coalition to End Hunger and Homelessness in Los Angeles, James goes to bat for other CalWORKs parents who are "faced with some of the same problems I was faced with"-reduced welfare checks, domestic violence, homelessness. James has been collecting the stories of some of these parents.

In San Francisco, Stephanie Hughes, a CalWORKs mother who works part time for the Coalition for Ethical Welfare Reform, went door-to-door in the Bayview/Hunter's Point district, encouraging moms on welfare to share their experiences. Welfare advocates around the state sent these "herstories" to legislators throughout March, Women's History Month. Now they're being compiled in a book to be released on Mother's Day.

James' and Hughes' efforts are part of a statewide and national push to give parents on welfare and their advocates a voice in reshaping the federal welfare reform law, up for renewal by September 30 this year.

Reshaping welfare reform

Six years ago the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act (PRWORA) dramatically changed the lives of low-income families. From now on, it said,

• Parents receiving welfare had to get jobs as soon as possible.
• Welfare benefits were no longer guaranteed, only available until funds ran out.
• No one could collect welfare for more than five years in a lifetime.

This new, limited program of aid to families was called Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF)-California's TANF program is CalWORKs.

Has TANF worked? People passionately disagree. Since PRWORA, the number of families on welfare has been cut in half. Child poverty has also fallen, but not as much. But most of the families who left welfare are still poor, the poorest worse off than ever. And there's little evidence that any of this has helped two-thirds of the people on welfare-children.

Through national coalitions like the National Campaign for Jobs and Income Support and statewide coalitions like the California Welfare Justice Coalition, local groups of welfare families and advocates are pressing for some basic changes in PRWORA. 

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Since the welfare reform law (Personal Responsibility and work Opportunity Act-PWRORA) was passed:

Sources of statistics:

Manpower Demonstration Research Corporation, Urban Institute, Children's Defense Fund, Department of Health and Human Services, Center on Law and Social Policy, Harvard Graduate School of Education, Future of Children Spring 2002

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Reports on welfare reform

• For an excellent chart comparing welfare proposals from President Bush, mainstream Democrats, and progressive Democrats, go to the website of the California Budget Project, http://www.cbp.org

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Advocates want more help for families

The California Welfare Justice Coalition, the National Campaign for Jobs and Income Support, and other advocacy groups are calling for big changes in welfare. They want Congress to:

Reduce poverty, not caseloads

Under PRWORA, states get bonuses from the federal government if they reduce the number of people on welfare. Instead, advocates say, states should be rewarded if they reduce poverty.

Maintain or increase TANF funds

Because fewer families are receiving cash aid, states have been able to use TANF money to provide child care, transportation, job training, English classes, and treatment for mental health and substance-abuse problems-supports that parents need in order to get and keep jobs. If the recession pushes more families onto welfare, the money for cash aid and necessary services should be there.

Stop the clock

Advocates say it's unfair to impose time limits on parents who are meeting welfare requirements.

"I am married with nine children under 16. My husband is terminally ill. I take care of him at home in the mornings and then I go to school for four hours, and then work a part-time job. My worker says to put my husband in a home so I could work full time, because I will not get money long. I recently found out about child care but I'm on a lot of waiting lists, which are very long. I guess they do what they can, but sometimes it's hard to do it all in such a short time frame."

-Nejmeh Abedhalem, San Francisco

"About a year ago I was forced to get on welfare because I became homeless and pregnant. I immediately got involved in a welfare-to-work program and met with people who were very helpful to me. I am now employed and have health insurance for myself and my son. I am still receiving welfare because my wage is so low. I am 'playing by the rules,' and my five-year time clock is still ticking. I think this is unfair!"

-Anonymous, San Francisco

End restrictions on education

PRWORA's policy is "work first," pushing parents on welfare to get jobs as soon as possible. It limits the number of parents who can attend educational or job-training programs and limits the length of those programs.

"Guadalupe is an American citizen, a devoted mother of four, and victim of physical abuse from her husband. After several years of marriage, Guadalupe left her husband. She enrolled in community college and began training to be a surgical technician. When welfare reform began, her employment case manager (ECM) told her she must withdraw from school and take a hotel cleaning job, the only thing she was qualified for.

"Guadalupe informed him she had spent her life in cleaning jobs. They never paid enough to live on, there were no benefits, and she was always getting laid off. The ECM insisted that she quit school. He received a pay bonus for every person he placed in a job. It took the connection with the Supportive Parents Information Network (SPIN) to protect Guadalupe's education. In spring 2001 she graduated from her training and immediately got a job earning $18 an hour."

-SPIN, San Diego

"The only group [of parents on welfare] likely to escape poverty by their earnings alone was those with at least a two-year post-secondary or vocational degree."

-Children's Defense Fund

Recognize mothers' work

"TANF fails to account for the work mothers already do in caring for their children," says the Welfare Justice Coalition. They want mothers of young children and children who need extra attention to be exempt from the work requirement.

"I became homeless after my house burned down in 1996. My youngest child was sexually assaulted in a homeless shelter. He was six at the time. Now, in school, he's been acting out what happened to him-the school calls me three or four times a day. I need to be in the classroom watching him, keeping him from getting sexual harassment write-ups-those stay with you! I need as a parent to be a strong support for him. CalWORKs doesn't permit me not to work, but my child needs me."

-Stephanie Hughes, San Francisco

Hold states accountable

If a welfare department feels a parent has broken a rule, they can apply a "sanction," reducing her welfare check by approximately $120. Research shows that many sanctions are applied in error. In other cases, the parent had specific problems that made it impossible to meet the requirement. Advocates say the federal government should make sure states don't apply unfair sanctions.

"In May 2000, my aid was cut from $746 to $626 because I showed up 10 minutes late to Job Club. I was late because I had to travel an hour and 20 minutes by bus to get there. As a result of being sanctioned, I became homeless with my three kids. I have moved four times since the sanction, living with different people, with my kids asking me, 'Why we don't have our own place, Mommy?' I finally have my own apartment. It has taken a year for my life to become somewhat stable again!"

-Yolanda James, Los Angeles

Provide support for immigrants

PRWORA created complex rules that barred many immigrants from receiving welfare during their first five years in this country. After PRWORA passed, the number of immigrants on welfare dropped 75 percent, says Veronica Quintero of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles (CHIRLA). A study of immigrant families in New York and L.A. found "extensive unmet food needs."

Many immigrants eligible for CalWORKs don't receive it, especially children who are U.S. citizens but whose parents are immigrants. Many more can't access benefits because they don't speak English well, says Quintero.

And many immigrants are aware that receiving cash aid now could count against them later if they leave the country and try to re-enter or if they apply for a green card, says Isabel Alegria of the Immigrant Welfare Collaborative.

"It isn't fair for us not to have benefits if we are helping to contribute to the taxes in this country. Witholding benefits ensures that we live in poverty. We need to be able to support our families."

-Teresa, Los Angeles

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It's poverty-not welfare-that hurts kids

Welfare-reform advocates claim that if parents go to work, children benefit from increased self-esteem and structure. But most researchers agree with Child Trends, a think tank that wrote:

"Poverty and the disadvantages associated with poverty are the key risk factors for children, whether their parents have left welfare, remain on welfare, or have never entered the welfare system."

In the Children's Defense Fund's welfare study, it found that "every welfare-to-work program that lifted participants' average incomes had mostly good effects on children. Every program that reduced income had mostly bad effects on children."

Best for kids: Jobs plus support

A study of 11 welfare-to-work programs concluded that programs that "made work pay"-providing cash supplements to earnings, child care subsidies, health insurance, transportation, and other supports-were the only ones that helped kids.

Minnesota's Family Investment Program (MFIP) got the best results: Preschool and elementary school children's learning and behavior improved. Fewer mothers were depressed and fewer used "harsh parenting" methods. In addition, more of the parents got married or stayed married, and fewer experienced domestic violence. How did they do it?

MFIP supplemented earnings with cash aid and other supports. The "critical factor," said researchers, was that mothers were allowed to work part time (not more than 20 hours a week) if their children were under six-it was the part-time workers whose "parenting style" improved.

Higher incomes helped kids

One experiment gave extra income to poor families and found that kids scored higher on school readiness and social skills. When poor families got a supplement of about $4,500 a year for three years, their kids scored as well as kids who had never been poor. Even with small increases in income, three-year-olds knew more colors and shapes and understood more words.

Jobs alone didn't help

When welfare departments required parents to get jobs but gave them no extra cash aid, their incomes didn't go up. Most researchers found that programs like this had few effects on kids.

Getting poorer hurt kids

In families whose incomes went down, children, on average, had more problems: increases in behavior or mental-health problems, more school suspensions, more trips to the emergency room, more foster care.

Teens suffered

Many studies found worse outcomes for teenagers when their parents got a job. Some found teens got worse grades, others found that, in addition, they had more behavior problems. Researchers thought the problems for teens came because their parents weren't there for them and also because many of them had to care for younger siblings.

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