Michigan Works Scrambles & Finds Summer Employment for Berrien County Youth

"With state and federal funding evaporating, the people at Michigan Works in March expected to place only 80 young people in its Summer Youth Employment Program. Most years they had been able to employ 200 workers. In 2009 they placed more than 800 in jobs with federal stimulus dollars.

"We had consistent funding for six years," said Candace Elders, director of communications for the local Michigan Works Association branch, the job placement and training program serving Berrien, Cass and Van Buren counties.

But with an economy that continues to struggle and dwindling government revenue, that pool had vanished.

That left Michigan Works scrambling to find new funding sources to get area youths out of the house, off the streets and into jobs. They tapped into nine funding sources and succeeded in placing 350 youth with 75 companies and organizations, including the Michigan Department of Transportation, the Berrien County Department of Human Services, Michigan Rehabilitation Services and Harbor Shores."

www.heraldpalladium.com/articles/2010/08/14/local_news/1717016.txt

Do Government Anti-Fraud Programs Make It Too Difficult for the Poor to Receive Assistance?

Religion and Ethics Newsweekly, a national PBS program, asks some important questions in this week's edition:

Are anti-fraud programs making it too difficult for honest, poor people who need assistance to get that assistance? Or are anti-fraud programs necessary to protect tax payers' money?

One person who volunteers with the poor thinks that such anti-fraud programs are "... terrible. I think it’s a way of criminalizing poverty, and it is a way of making people feel ashamed of asking for help."

A county administrator in San Diego, California who runs such an anti-fraud program thinks that such programs: "... provide an integrity component to the public aid that goes out to those people in need, and without that integrity program then there is no way to insure that the monies go out to the people that are actually eligible, deserving, and actually have the need."

Another professor who is an advocate for the poor says: "For us it’s not the issue that you’re checking for fraud. We think that’s a reasonable thing to do, because you've got to protect the public dollar. It’s when you create a program that is, makes it difficult to get the benefit and then doesn’t demonstrate any benefit to the county or the state or the taxpayer. So we’re paying for a program that no one can prove has any impact."

The full report which centers on a controversial and aggressive anti-fraud welfare program in San Diego County California may be viewed or read at:

www.pbs.org/wnet/religionandethics/episodes/august-13-2010/cutbacks-and-the-poor/6782/