Prisoners of a system

by Alexandra Cuff/PNN media intern

As the sun climbed higher in the July morning, the strip of shade, offered by the charcoal block of awning at the check-cashing mart on 19th and Mission, receded into the crumbling brick of the wall. When I finally moved up in line far enough so that I was inside the building, I had already been waiting on food stamps for 30 minutes. I was definitely going to be late for work. Damn, I had already spent 3 full mornings sitting in the waiting room of DHS for my GA application to be reviewed and accepted. And now, late for work again, chances are I’ll lose the job. As a child growing up in a white middle-class family on long island, I did not know poverty. The word "welfare" did not ever conjure up an image at all. It was a word maybe mentioned in a social studies class. It was a word used to describe other people. The first time I saw a food stamp was while working in a small grocery store in a poor town in North Carolina where parents would come in with lots of kids and buy a month’s worth of meat to freeze and boxes of nutritional-free cereal. I didn’t necessarily blame them for being poor – hell I was a poor (and privileged) student – but I didn’t think that I would ever be on welfare.

After my experiences in applying for welfare in San Francisco, I know well the inefficient mode of getting people help. It causes us to spend more time running around for documents, filling out paperwork than it does being out in the fresh air, taking care of children or looking for a job. Looking back, I feel like I was waiting in line for a month. Each time I felt I was getting closer and closer to the abstract castle which Kafka’s "K" is seeking out in his bureaucracy-bashing novel the Castle. I know now that this system works in machine-like inhuman ways designed to beat back those in need.

I was excited when I was assigned to cover the July 19th media briefing on welfare reform at the World Affairs Council building in downtown San Francisco. Between Gavin Newsome’s insidious plan to slash GA benefits and welfare reform up for reauthorization this year, there is a lot of unchecked power at hand that can seriously affect the poor folk both here in the Bay Area and nationwide. Even as a welfare recipient, I was not aware of the history behind the last reform nor did I know the extreme provisions being proposed by the Bush Administration this time around. I don’t think that most of us, especially those not on welfare, know the injustice and idiocy around current and possible future policy.

In 1996, Bill Clinton’s welfare reform (or welfare deform) ended Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) and introduced a block grant program called Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF). The 3 most consequential changes included a five-year limit on cash aid to adults with children, a rigorous work requirement, and the elimination of benefits to legal immigrants. This did nothing to reduce the poverty or homelessness in California. There are 1000 more families on welfare in California now than there were in October 2000, an increase of almost 40 families a month. The only thing it reduced was the caseloads. A new welfare law will be passed in the next couple months and we could be looking at increased work requirements, insufficient funding for childcare, transportation, higher education and vocational training, and a new "marriage promotion" program. What will this mean for the 700 families who will hit their 5-year time limit for welfare benefits in 2003?

On Friday morning, I met with other people who are concerned with finding out the truth about how welfare reform impacts the families and communities most directly affected by these issues. The media briefing was sponsored by the Coalition for Ethical Welfare Reform, Independent Press Association, Media Alliance, Pacific News Service, and National Campaign for Jobs and Income Support. We represented women, people of color, low-income families, and grassroots organizations that are, for some reason, not part of the policy making.

It’s interesting that a country so concerned with family values and with a president who apparently thinks that government-supported marriage promotion is the end all for poverty and violence, would put childcare at the bottom of the priority list with less than $6 billion in funding for the fiscal year 2002 to be divided by 50 states!! There is a correlation between single mothers not having affordable childcare (would free childcare be too much to ask from the richest country in the world?) and not being able to make a living wage. Contrary to the mainstream view of single mothers and other welfare recipients, this is not laziness. They don’t have people to take care of their children! This could be the difference between working and leaving your babies at home alone. Elected officials will never admit it but our society simply chooses not to invest in childcare.

Star Smith loves her job. She works 20 hours a week for the Coalition on Homelessness doing outreach to families living in SROs. In 1999 she was convicted of a drug felony. After being incarcerated and going through a drug treatment program, Star gave birth to her first son. When the father of the baby left she was responsible for both earning a living as well as providing uncompensated childcare. So she applied for welfare. Welfare, a supposed income-support program designed to help if you lose your job or are otherwise financially disadvantaged and have little money left to pay rent and feed yourself and family.

For Star there is no support. Due to her history of one felony, she is banned from all welfare for the rest of her life. She works 20-hours a week advocating for and supporting other poor families in San Francisco, sells jewelry to supplement that income and supports herself and her son. She is not eligible for subsidized childcare, training or education money, HUD or section 8 housing. She even moved in with her partner upon the suggestion of her caseworker after being told she can’t make it alone. Ask Star how she feels about the current welfare system: "Try to do anything in life when the government is putting up roadblocks. I paid for my crime through the criminal justice system, I shouldn’t have to pay for it through the welfare system." As far as I’m concerned, this is a big Fuck You to working families in general.

When the briefing was over, I spoke with 22-year old Rina Phou. Rina’s family has been on welfare since they moved to the United States from Cambodia. Rina’s father is disabled and her mother stays at home to care for him. Since Rina was 12 years old, she has been working to contribute to the family income. She has been working full time since she was 14 years old to support her parents and 3 brothers who all live in a one-bedroom apartment in the Tenderloin. Education is important to Rina and although having to work full time through high school, she has maintained a 3.5 GPA. She worries though for her 2 younger brothers who are growing up and equating life with work. Her 16-year old brother wants to stay in school and play sports but he has to find work. His grades are dropping because he is looking for job. Her 12-year old brother wants to work instead of going to school. Rina is paying for her brothers’ books and clothing.

I can’t imagine having that responsibility as a 22-year old let alone a 14-year old. Rina told me, "I don’t regret anything. All this drama made me a stronger person. I learned not to feel sorry for myself." She also admits though that it was difficult going to school with other youth who did not have to work. "I felt left out but I was lucky compared to people in Cambodia which is so poor." What will Rina’s family do when their 5-year limit is up? She fears that her parents will have to find dish washing jobs or another minimum wage job.

Rina’s parents would go from not working and being poor to working, possibly endangering her father’s health and still remaining poor! Within today’s booming economy, I have english speaking friends with industrial hygiene, psychology, and computer science degrees who are unable to find work. TANF’s stringent work requirements will force welfare recipients, no longer eligible, into low-paying, part-time positions with no hope of saving money, let alone making a living wage.

According to research done by Asians and Pacific Islanders for Reproductive Health, an organization out of Oakland, CA "welfare programs do little to assist poor, Southeast Asian communities and in fact continue to trap them in poverty. Within Alameda County County, Southeast Asians are the second largest group of welfare recipients. Many Alameda County welfare offices do not provide interpretation and translation services to large Southeast Asian populations, burdening youth to interpret for their parents at welfare office visits."

In June, the Senate Finance Committee passed its welfare bill, which differs from the House of Representatives and Bush Administration proposals. The Senate Finance Committee bill proposes to maintain the 30-hour per week work requirement and will restore TANF benefits to immigrants. In contrast, the House bill which passed in May will increase the work requirements to 40-hours a week and will provide little funding for childcare and transportation. Both of these bills are still promoting marriage and two-parent family solutions to poverty.

It’s infuriating to know that the difference between some of us living on the street or in an apartment, could be decided by folks who have never known what it’s like to plan a month around a $300 check. It’s disgusting that the poor in this country are really prisoners of a system which they’ve done nothing to offend but be poor and that the actual prison system, jails themselves, take a higher priority than childcare. We need welfare that is going to do what it says.