CPR

Center for Parental Responsibility

P.O. Box 130776 St. Paul, MN 55113 Telephone: 651/490-9277

Website: cpr-mn.org Email: info@cpr-mn.org

January 2004

Legislative Education Notice (6^th in SERIES)

Dear ________________________________________ RE: BILL # - HF 1031/SF 974

Nonpartisan Welfare Reform

Current iv-d welfare services program runs contrary to

the congressional purpose of the program.

(It’s now hurting the very people it was meant to help (i.e. women, children, needy citizens, and taxpayers!)

Citizens Group Claims Public Spending On ineligible self-sufficient applicants

Threatens the Future Of A Public Program designed to reduce welfare costs,

resulting in

Public Welfare Services Are Now

provided to Affluent Families, misappropriating Scarce Funds Which must instead be Made Available To

More Adequately Serve Needy Families.

Solution: Pass hf1031/sf974 (IV-D Eligibility Standards)

to Avert A welfare Financing Crisis!

History And Congressional Purpose Of The IV-D Program

“[T]he central goal of Congress when it created the child support program back in 1975 was recovering the costs incurred by taxpayers in providing welfare benefits. Many single mothers who received no financial support from their children's father had difficulty earning enough money to meet their children's basic needs. As a result, they sought out help from taxpayers in the form of cash welfare and other public benefits. Senator Russell Long of Louisiana, the major author of the child support enforcement program, wanted to find such fathers, establish paternity if necessary, obtain a child support order, and collect money from them. If the children were on welfare or had been on welfare, Senator Long believed it was appropriate for the government to keep at least part of the money collected from these absent fathers to reimburse taxpayers for the costs of welfare. Taxpayers had stepped in for these absent fathers; now it was the fathers' turn to repay taxpayers. Senator Long's vision became a major feature of the child support enforcement program that became law in 1975.

Ron Haskins, Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution. Testimony Before the Subcommittee on Human Resources of the House Committee on Ways and Means, Hearing on Child Support and Fatherhood, June 28, 2001

Financial Crunch Awaiting The IV-D Program

The number of [non]-welfare cases have been growing steadily since the beginning of the program in the 1970s. The number of welfare cases grew initially but have been declining in recent years. The increase in non-welfare cases represents rising costs for state child support programs because all the child support collected in these cases is paid directly to the custodial parent. Unlike the welfare cases, in which states often are entitled to keep part of the collections, states are generally not allowed to keep any of the child support collections in non-welfare cases.

By contrast with the growth of non-welfare cases, the drop in welfare cases is an outgrowth of the dramatic success of the 1996 welfare reforms and the strong economy. Although this caseload decline is good for state TANF budgets because there are now less than half as many TANF recipients as there were in 1995 in the average state, the caseload declines threaten to be a disaster for state child support enforcement financing. The average state receives about 30 percent of the funds necessary to run its child support program from retained collections in welfare cases and former welfare cases. In the case of current welfare cases, states keep virtually 100 percent of child support collections in exchange for taxpayer-provided welfare benefits.

But because the welfare cases have fallen so dramatically, this source of income for state child support programs has also been falling.” Id.

Bottom Line

Legislators must decide, either:

a) increase funding to maintain the status quo and provide welfare to the self-sufficient and non-needy (private cases), OR

b) make a courageous change, and cut costs of IV-D or redistribute the funds to the truly needy (public cases), by eliminating affluent, non-needy families from the IV-D welfare program.

Alternative for the ineligible: Those with the financial means can acquire the services privately without government assistance.

I suggest you contact CPR for a simple presentation outlining all supporting research that allows the MN legislators to stop services to the non-needy to redistribute the money to protect needy families.

Name:_________________________________(print) ____________________________________(signature)

Address:___________________________________ City: __________________ State: MN Zip: ___________

Phone Number: ____________________________ Email: ____________________________

From A Constituent and/or Interested Citizen Involved in Community Solutions