Yet the state's uncertain budget climate and questions about implementation mean the fate of such reforms are uncertain, Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance Commissioner David Hansell told a group of welfare advocates – many of whom have long held that better integrating education into public assistance would help people get off welfare.
On Oct. 1, the federal Department of Health and Human Services puts into effect its final rules governing Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, which since 1996 has been the primary federal welfare program. As expected when HHS first floated its initial revised regulations more than two years ago, they significantly tighten what states can do to be considered in compliance with federal welfare law. The percentage of welfare recipients in specified work activities must increase, while what counts as "work" has been restricted, and municipal reporting requirements have grown.
Yet the final rules issued in February also take into account criticism that strict "work first" rules made it impossible for people to study their way out of poverty, and loosen restrictions around entering educational programs while on welfare.
Hansell, who was elevated from chief of staff at the New York City Human Resources Administration (HRA) to the state's top welfare position at the beginning of then-Gov. Eliot Spitzer's administration, made clear the state intends to leap at the chance to expand educational opportunities for the poor.
"We're trying to balance what has been a very strong work focus of our public assistance programs in New York state with a greater emphasis on education and training than we've had in the past," he told a meeting of the Welfare Reform Network, a 19-year-old coalition of antipoverty groups. "Our goal is to give all public assistance recipients the opportunity to engage in programs that will help take them to the next educational level [and] increase their earning capacity."
Advocates for the poor have long asserted that education is the surest route out of poverty. Hansell noted that among full-time workers, high school graduates see an average 41 percent increase in their earnings over non-graduates, and a two-year college degree is accompanied by an additional 21 percent earnings bump. Census data likewise show that while just 9 percent of children of college-educated parents in New York state live below the federal poverty line, 30 percent of children of parents with just a high school degree –and 54 percent of those whose parents didn't complete high school – are officially poor.
Hansell said in the next month or two the state will issue its own proposed regulations under which the local social services districts that actually implement welfare programs will be asked to:
• Assess the educational level of all welfare recipients, assigning those not at a 9th-grade reading level to basic education programs, and placing those with basic literacy but no high-school diploma into GED programs.
• Count unsupervised homework time (up to a maximum of one hour per hour of class time) as "work activity" hours for welfare eligibility purposes, as will now be allowed under the new federal regs.
