By MARK SCOLFORO,
Associated Press
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — The Pennsylvania Public Welfare Department will start asking food stamp recipients next week to prove they don't have significant personal assets in order to qualify for benefits.
Advocates for the poor say the new policy will be expensive to administer and hurt families for whom the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program can be a lifeline. It goes into effect Tuesday, but it will be about six months before the department knows how many have lost benefits.
"The majority who will lose benefits — the significant majority — are seniors and people with disabilities," Julie Zaebst, policy center manager for the Greater Philadelphia Coalition Against Hunger, said Friday. "In our experience, many of those folks are saving for medical expenses and funeral expenses."
The asset test is designed to prevent food stamps from going to anyone under age 60 with certain assets worth more than $5,500. The threshold climbs to $9,000 for those 60 and older. The rules pertain to cash, stocks and bonds, but not to pension plans, retirement accounts, home values or life insurance.
About 1.8 million Pennsylvanians in 880,000 households currently receive food stamps, and Public Welfare spokeswoman Carey Miller said the new rules are projected to affect less than 1 percent of them. The average recipient gets $35 a week in food stamps, and the maximum monthly benefits for a family of four is $668.
"A way for us to ensure that individuals who have readily available resources will first deplete that before relying solely on public assistance," Miller said. "This is our way of trying to preserve the benefit for those who have no additional means or resources."
Miller said agency employees were sent a memo outlining the policy and their duties, but the transition was expected to be aided by the fact that many recipients already get other benefits for which there was already an asset test in place.
"At this time, the welfare offices are significantly understaffed and burdened by paperwork," Zaebst said. "So we definitely have concerns about anything that would add red tape."
Officials have said about 4,000 families will be affected.
Zaebst noted the money was coming from the federal government, so cutting people off the rolls will not help the state's budget picture.
"So that money's going to essentially sit in D.C. rather than flowing into the Commonwealth once this policy goes into effect," Zaebst said.
The gross monthly income limit for a family of four to qualify is $2,890, or $3,726 for households that include elderly or disabled people.
Source
I wasn't sure what other tags to put.
Don't you just love how you have to be completely flat broke before the commonwealth will deign to even consider helping you? And by love, I mean seething hatred.
Associated Press
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — The Pennsylvania Public Welfare Department will start asking food stamp recipients next week to prove they don't have significant personal assets in order to qualify for benefits.
Advocates for the poor say the new policy will be expensive to administer and hurt families for whom the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program can be a lifeline. It goes into effect Tuesday, but it will be about six months before the department knows how many have lost benefits.
"The majority who will lose benefits — the significant majority — are seniors and people with disabilities," Julie Zaebst, policy center manager for the Greater Philadelphia Coalition Against Hunger, said Friday. "In our experience, many of those folks are saving for medical expenses and funeral expenses."
The asset test is designed to prevent food stamps from going to anyone under age 60 with certain assets worth more than $5,500. The threshold climbs to $9,000 for those 60 and older. The rules pertain to cash, stocks and bonds, but not to pension plans, retirement accounts, home values or life insurance.
About 1.8 million Pennsylvanians in 880,000 households currently receive food stamps, and Public Welfare spokeswoman Carey Miller said the new rules are projected to affect less than 1 percent of them. The average recipient gets $35 a week in food stamps, and the maximum monthly benefits for a family of four is $668.
"A way for us to ensure that individuals who have readily available resources will first deplete that before relying solely on public assistance," Miller said. "This is our way of trying to preserve the benefit for those who have no additional means or resources."
Miller said agency employees were sent a memo outlining the policy and their duties, but the transition was expected to be aided by the fact that many recipients already get other benefits for which there was already an asset test in place.
"At this time, the welfare offices are significantly understaffed and burdened by paperwork," Zaebst said. "So we definitely have concerns about anything that would add red tape."
Officials have said about 4,000 families will be affected.
Zaebst noted the money was coming from the federal government, so cutting people off the rolls will not help the state's budget picture.
"So that money's going to essentially sit in D.C. rather than flowing into the Commonwealth once this policy goes into effect," Zaebst said.
The gross monthly income limit for a family of four to qualify is $2,890, or $3,726 for households that include elderly or disabled people.
Source
I wasn't sure what other tags to put.
Don't you just love how you have to be completely flat broke before the commonwealth will deign to even consider helping you? And by love, I mean seething hatred.
Yep, in my state as well. Here you are automatically ineligible if you are a student. Because, obviously, if you are working a low paying job, education to help you achieve a better job is a terrible idea.
edit: and don't even get me started on the difference between something that has monetary value but is relatively impossible to sell for that value, like an antique car or family heirloom jewelry...
Edited at 2012-05-03 12:19 am (UTC)
I really don't know why they are so stingy anyway. When we got them for 6 months, we were a family of 3 living on $21,000 a year and they only gave us $106 a month. My spouse got a 50 cents an hour raise at work and we no longer qualified at the 6 month point, ha.
(I know little about Pell Grants, but
(I know little about Pell Grants, but <a href="Students may use their grants at any one of approximately 5,400 participating postsecondary institutions."</a> seems to imply it's not supposed to be living money anyway.)
One of the other annoying things about food stamps is that they only count certain bills. They don't count credit card payments as a monthly expense, so while we had to say we had X number of dollars in the bank, we weren't allowed to submit that the money was going towards credit cards (that we had used to buy FOOD with of course) so to them we did have "extra" money in the bank. Only our mortgage, phone, power and car bills counted to subtract from the money we actually have on hand monthly. Now that we don't have income from a job, that Pell grant help is essential to helping us stay afloat and out of bankruptcy by paying the minimum payments...of course it's all extra spending money to them.
WELL SUCK IT OLD PEOPLE. FOODSTAMPS(tm) isn't the kind of assistance you get to improve your life, be responsible or plan for the future. In FACT we ensure with FOODSTAMPS(tm) that you'll have a hard time making it through the month, keeping your mind focused on the very real present, no need to think of the future, or (GOD'n'GUN FEARIN JESUS FORBID) get out to vote or do the ever increasing list of shit we proscribe just to be ABLE to vote...
Trying to save for university and think FOODSTAMPS(tm) will help you put a little bit more money into that fund because your shitty job(s) (the reason(s) you want to get more education) won't pay you enough? WELL SUCK IT STUDENTS. You're more useful to us wrapped in debt so deep you'll never get out.
Think you want to put some money away to hope that your children will be able to have a better future by not having to be completely debt ridden to get through college? Hoping that you can break the cycle of poverty and you'll have someone to take care of you when you're old so that you can avoid having to be on 'the system'?! WELL SUCK IT PARENTS. You chose to have kids anyway. In fact. This is all your fault, don't you know how expensive children are?! You shouldn't have had one if you couldn't afford it. Now, quickly finish up, we have to go and legislate birth control inaccessible, cut sex ed out of schools, and attack abortion doctors.
FOODSTAMPS(tm)... 'loving help', brought to you by: BOOTSTRAPS.