[Faith & Hunger] TU Letter to Editor on Welfare Grants

[Dunleamark at AOL.COM]

>From a high school intern with HANNYS. Please consider sending your own 
version to local papers.

Spitzer disappoints by not raising welfare grants 

First published: Monday, February 12, 2007 

Gov. Eliot Spitzer, in his newly released budget, made some promising steps 
toward fighting poverty in New York state. He increased funding to the Hunger 
Prevention and Nutrition Awareness Program for emergency food programs by $5.15 
million. 
  
He promised to invest in work-supplement programs. But he failed to increase 
New York's woefully inadequate basic welfare grant. 

More than 550,000 people in this state receive welfare benefits, of which 
approximately 350,000 are children. Most of the remainder are single mothers. 

To receive welfare benefits, all but the very young, the disabled and the 
elderly must comply with strict work requirements set forth by welfare reform in 
1996. These people are not lazy -- they are struggling, and they need help. 

The current basic welfare grant, which has not been raised since 1990, 
amounts to $291 monthly for a family of three, or $9.70 per day for food, clothing, 
school supplies and so forth. The prices of these items are higher than ever 
before; butter now costs more than twice what it did 16 years ago, and the 
price of paper towels has quadrupled. 

Once the welfare shelter allowance, intended to provide funds sufficient for 
adequate housing, is included, the combined welfare benefit amounts to roughly 
half the federal poverty level, and more importantly, it does not amount to 
nearly enough. 

On five separate occasions, New York courts have found this shelter benefit 
to be illegally low, but the state continues to appeal the rulings instead of 
helping needy children and their families. 

While Spitzer has shown that he is more dedicated to combating poverty than 
George Pataki, his real commitment remains to be seen. 

If it is truly there, then let Eliot Spitzer do what needs to be done to 
provide the needy people of his state with a welfare grant they can live on. 

GABRIEL TOMASULO 
Glenmont