Our entire welfare system is designed to breed dependency- once you’ve become skilled at milking the system, breaking free is almost impossible. If you want to know how destructive and corrupt welfare is, ask anybody who’s on it. As a result, the state’s general assistance program as managed by the state and municipalities needs immediate reform.
My proposals include establishing a statewide residency requirement for general assistance and a lifetime benefit limit to five years. I propose expanding the workfare program which provides municipalities the right to require general assistance recipients to work in exchange for benefits to mandate that all recipients perform valuable community service such as working in libraries, community centers, meals on wheels, etc… or for private sector employers. Recipients with disabilities would be required to perform community services within the scope of their respective ability.
We need a welfare system that encourages recipients to seek better wages without the consequences of immediately losing all of their benefits. Therefore, I propose establishing a five tier income system beginning at the state poverty level to the state earning wage level. Once a recipient reaches the next tier of income, the tier benefits drop by only 20%, until they reach the next tier where benefits would drop by another 20% and so on until they reach the state’s earning wage.
Finally, service center communities are shouldering the majority of the property tax burden for general assistance recipients. As more folks move from rural areas to service center communities there is a disproportionate burden on a minority of taxpayers. We should enforce our current state law which requires all communities to pay for the general assistance of their respective residents who choose to move from one community to another for the first thirty days after moving.
