• 1 in 4 children in US raised by a single parent, By Christine Armario (AP), April 27, 2011, Miami Herald: “One in four children in the United States is being raised by a single parent - a percentage that has been on the rise and is higher than other developed countries, according to a report released Wednesday. Of the 27 industrialized countries studied by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, the U.S. had 25.8 percent of children being raised by a single parent, compared with an average of 14.9 percent across the other countries. Ireland was second (24.3 percent), followed by New Zealand (23.7 percent). Greece, Spain, Italy and Luxemborg had among the lowest percentages of children in single-parent homes. Experts point to a variety of factors to explain the high U.S. figure, including a cultural shift toward greater acceptance of single-parent child rearing. The U.S. also lacks policies to help support families, including childcare at work and national paid maternity leave, which are commonplace in other countries…”
• UK spends more on families than most OECD countries, By Karen McVeigh, April 27, 2011, The Guardian: “Britain is one of the biggest investors in families across all countries of the Organisation of Co-operation and Economic Development (OECD), according to a report looking at how governments support families. It spent 3.6% of its GDP on family benefits, compared to an OECD average of 2.2% over all benefits, in 2007. Only Denmark and France spent more, at 3.7% each. The OECD report into family life has found the UK spends more on each child than most other OECD countries, more than £138,000 from birth up to the age of 18, compared to an OECD average of £95,000. Most of it, 2.1% of GDP, spent on families was spent on cash benefits, such as child benefit and working tax credit. However, in terms of better outcomes for families, such as the ability to lift children out of poverty, gender equality and family employment, Britain lags behind countries which spend less…”
• More Irish children live in poverty than OECD average, By Joanne Hunt, April 29, 2011, Irish Times: “The Poorest in society are no longer pensioners but families with children, an OECD study has found. Doing Better for Families, the Organisation of Economic Co-operation and Development’s report on family wellbeing, says families with children are more likely to be poor than in previous decades, when the poorest were more likely to be pensioners. The study finds that while poverty in households with children is rising in nearly all OECD countries, 16.3 per cent of Irish children now live in poverty, well above the OECD average of 12.7 per cent…”
• One child in four in single-parent home, By Bronwyn Torrie, April 30, 2011, Dominion Post: “New Zealand has the third-highest rate of children living in single-parent homes, an OECD study says. This means nearly one in four Kiwi children are growing up in single-parent homes as more marriages break up and single women choose to enter motherhood on their own. Of 27 industrialised countries, New Zealand ranked third in the Doing Better for Families study, with 23.7 per cent of children living in a one-parent household, compared with the 14.9 per cent average across all countries. The United States ranked first with 25.9 per cent and Ireland was second with 24.3 per cent…”

• Report: Fewer NJ residents in poverty getting legal aid, By Susan Loyer, April 26, 2011, MyCentralJersey.com: “Fewer low-income residents are receiving the legal representation they are entitled to receive in civil cases, according to a report released by Legal Services of New Jersey. ‘The Civil Justice Gap,’ released Tuesday, examines the shortfalls in legal aid for New Jerseyans living in poverty, its consequences and offers solutions. ‘There are many more people in poverty because of the recession,’ said Melville D. Miller Jr., president of Legal Services of New Jersey. ‘The newly poor, who lost jobs and were middle class, are dealing for the first time with things like foreclosures, evictions and domestic violence, all of which is induced by the new poverty. As a result, the demand for our services is up sharply.’ With a 20 percent to 45 percent increase in the demand for free legal services statewide and funding down by 35 percent during the past few years, Legal Services i forced to turn people away, Miller said…”
• Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s budget plan cuts legal services for poor, By Paul Srubas, April 25, 2011, Green Bay Press-Gazette: “A proposed funding cut to the state’s computerized court records system is part of a larger plan that would eliminate funding of a program that provides free legal aid to the poor. Gov. Scott Walker has proposed reallocating money collected as a fee when certain documents are filed in circuit courts around the state. The $21.50 filing fee currently pays for a variety of state programs. Under law, the amount is divided up, with each portion going to a specific program, such as $6 of every $21.50 going to the Consolidated Court Automation Program. The program, called CCAP, serves as the information technology department for the court systems throughout the state and makes court records available online through the Wisconsin Circuit Court Access database. A program providing civil legal services for the poor receives $4 from each $21.50 fee…”

• Curb on use of welfare cash OK’d, By Michael Levenson, April 27, 2011, Boston Globe: “House lawmakers voted unanimously last night to ban welfare recipients from spending their cash benefits on alcohol, tobacco, and lottery tickets, reigniting an issue that flared during Governor Deval Patrick’s reelection campaign last year. The House approved the ban, as part of a larger amendment to the state budget, on a 155-0 vote. The measure not only targets welfare recipients, it also bans store owners from accepting welfare debit cards for purchases of alcohol, tobacco, and lottery tickets. Store owners who violate the ban could be fined $500 for the first offense, and more than $1,000 for subsequent offenses…”
• Bill would restrict where state welfare funds can be used, By John Stang, April 27, 2011, Kitsap Sun: “The Washington Senate on Wednesday approved an overhaul of the state’s WorkFirst program that tightens controls over how welfare payments may be spent. The 44-0 vote sends the bill to the House. The state’s Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program includes a WorkFirst component that requires recipients to seek jobs. A state study unveiled in February said the WorkFirst program cannot adequately function in its current financial set up. The study recommended a review of eligibility requirements and of the amounts of financial assistance given to families. The bill suspends the WorkFirst requirements for some families until July 1, 2012, when the state Department of Health and Human Services is supposed to begin phasing in a revamped WorkFirst program…”

• Americans depend more on federal aid than ever, By Dennis Cauchon, April 26, 2011, USA Today: “Americans depended more on government assistance in 2010 than at any other time in the nation’s history, a USA TODAY analysis of federal data finds. The trend shows few signs of easing, even though the economic recovery is nearly 2 years old. A record 18.3% of the nation’s total personal income was a payment from the government for Social Security, Medicare, food stamps, unemployment benefits and other programs in 2010. Wages accounted for the lowest share of income - 51.0% - since the government began keeping track in 1929. The income data show how fragile and government-dependent the recovery is after a recession that officially ended in June 2009…”
• New Yorkers lead pack in government benefits, By Dennis Cauchon, April 26, 2011, USA Today: “New Yorkers get more government aid per person from social programs than residents of any other state, a USA TODAY analysis finds. The state’s Medicaid program is the most expensive in the nation, driving the average cost of all government benefits in New York to $9,442 per person. New York ranks 28th in Social Security payments per person and 9th in Medicare benefits. But the spending on Medicaid, the health program for the poor, is far above that in any other state. Only Washington, D.C., spends more…”

In Florida, H.M.O.’s would treat Medicaid patients, By Lizette Alvarez, April 27, 2011, New York Times: “A crucial experiment in the future of Medicaid is playing out in Florida, where both houses of the Legislature are vying to find ways to drastically cut costs, manage care and reduce waste and fraud. The cuts and changes being sought by the Republican-led Legislature and encouraged by the new Republican governor, Rick Scott, a wealthy former hospital company executive, are deeper than those in many other states. In the past 11 years, the cost of Medicaid in Florida has grown to $21 billion from $9 billion and amounts to a third of the state budget. The federal government pays more than half the tab…”

Most states seen raising jobless tax on businesses, By Michael Cooper, April 27, 2011, New York Times: “As persistently high unemployment has drained the funds that are used to pay jobless benefits, more than two-thirds of the states expect to raise taxes on businesses this year to replenish them, according to a survey of labor agencies released Wednesday. Unemployment taxes remain low by historical standards: the survey, by the National Association of State Workforce Agencies, found that states have effectively cut the unemployment tax rate on businesses by 64 percent since the unemployment program began collecting taxes from employers in 1938…”

Budget cuts could give Oregon the shortest time line in the nation for cash assistance program, By Michelle Cole, April 27, 2011, The Oregonian: “Oregon lawmakers are considering budget cuts that would kick families off welfare cash assistance after 18 months. If approved, the proposal, which is also included in the governor’s budget, would leave Oregon with the shortest time limit in the nation. Currently, families may receive government cash assistance for as long as five years. Shortening to an 18-month, lifetime limit would save Oregon $11.6 million over two years. State officials estimate the change could affect 7,500 families. Neither Democrats nor Republicans like the idea but they say there’s no way to protect Oregon’s social safety net completely in light of the state’s $3.5 billion budget hole and the end to federal stimulus dollars…”

• JCPS schools search for success against poverty’s stacked deck, By Chris Kenning, April 23, 2011, Louisville Courier-Journal: “It was just before 7:30 a.m., and youth-resource coordinator Lekiesha Davis was standing by Shawnee High School’s front entrance, exchanging hellos and handing out hugs to the students streaming into the hallway. But her task extended beyond the friendly morning welcome. Davis eyed each child closely for signs of exhaustion, dirty clothes or sullen, depressed glances that might signal a night of sleeplessness, domestic turmoil, or lack of food, electricity or supervision - problems that kids cart around every day in one of Louisville’s poorest neighborhoods, piling on to a lifetime of disadvantages that have already left them years behind their middle-income peers academically…”
• Solutions to high-poverty schools may lie outside the classroom, By Chris Kenning, April 23, 2011, Louisville Courier-Journal: “The solution to achieving success in America’s high-poverty schools must reach beyond the classroom, most educators say. That’s why several urban districts have turned their focus to finding their students social support -such as counseling, nutrition and after-school care -to help turn around their failing high-poverty schools. So far, however, many of those efforts have resulted in mix results - with no clear formula for lasting success, experts say…”
• Cincinnati’s Oyler Elementary finds winning formula to fight poverty, By Chris Kenning, April 23, 2011, Louisville Courier-Journal: “In the late 1990s, many of Cincinnati’s urban public schools were sliding into decline: Enrollments had shrunk, poverty had risen, achievement had fallen and voters were rejecting higher tax levies. Perhaps nowhere was that decline felt more than Oyler Elementary, tucked into Lower Price Hill, a poverty-stricken industrial neighborhood along the Ohio River built in the 1800s as factory housing by German immigrants. More than 80 percent of Oyler’s students never made it to tenth grade. It’s parents weren’t involved, and resources were scarce…”

Height: Very poor women are shrinking, as are their chances at a better life, By Donald G. McNeil Jr., April 25, 2011, New York Times: “The average height of very poor women in some developing countries has shrunk in recent decades, according to a new study by Harvard researchers. Height is a reliable indicator of childhood nutrition, disease and poverty. Average heights have declined among women in 14 African countries, the study found, and stagnated in 21 more in Africa and South America. That suggests, the authors said, that poor women born in the last two decades, especially in Africa, are worse off than their mothers or grandmothers born after World War II…”

• Food stamps equal big money, By Ginnie Graham and Gavin Off, April 24, 2011, Tulsa World: “Retail smokeshops, convenience stores, substance abuse rehabilitation centers and take-and-bake pizza shops across the state received millions in food stamp purchases during a nearly two-year period examined by the Tulsa World. But much of the nearly $1.2 billion in food stamp expenditures went to Walmart stores, which brought in about $506 million between July 2009 and March 2011, according to data supplied by the Oklahoma Department of Human Services. And though recipients might live within a mile of a store that accepts food stamps, most recipients travel more than 10 miles for the bulk of the food-stamp spending, according to the World’s analysis…”
• Food stamps a patch, not a panacea, By Ginnie Graham and Gavin Off, April 25, 2011, Tulsa World: “Wilford Case tries to be conservative with his monthly $90 in food stamps. He knows which store knocks down meat prices mid-month, what grocer has longer-lasting produce and once in awhile he’ll find an unexpected sale at a retailer farther from his home. ‘It helps me survive,’ Case said. ‘I don’t need much because it’s just me. I don’t have 19 kids or anything. I have to put a little money in to get dishwashing soap and things like that.’ But bargain shopping is tough because Case does not drive. He is on Social Security disability income because of epileptic seizures and relies on family members, neighbors and friends for rides. He offers money to the driver to help with rising gas prices…”
• Military commissaries see spike in food stamp usage, By Ginnie Graham and Gavin Off, April 24, 2011, Tulsa World: “Oklahoma military base commissaries received nearly $1.8 million in food stamp purchases during a nearly two-year period of state data examined by the Tulsa World. The World examined food stamp data provided by the Department of Human Services covering the period from July 2009 to March 2011. During that time, the average monthly purchases in food stamps, called the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, at the base commissaries grew by about 187 percent. Commissaries are available on base to active and retired military personnel and their families and offer grocery items usually lower in cost than at retail stores. The Fort Sill Army base in Lawton posted about $1.1 million in sales using food stamps, followed by about $625,000 at Tinker Air Force base in Midwest City, about $110,000 at Altus Air Force Base and about $5,000 at Vance Air Force Base in Enid. The growth in the monthly averages spent on food stamps has skyrocketed…”

Fraud taints state’s FoodShare program, By Raquel Rutledge and Jason Stein, April 23, 2011, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “Thousands of people who receive publicly funded food assistance report losing their benefits card routinely - a sign investigators say shows many are cheating the state’s $1 billion program. Some sell their Quest cards for cash. Others trade them for drugs. And that’s not the only way the state’s FoodShare program is being abused, an investigation by the Journal Sentinel has found. Instead of using the cards as intended - as a tool to keep the poor from going hungry - participants who aren’t hungry can use the cards to profit. Unscrupulous recipients sometimes buy steaks, seafood and other expensive items with their subsidized benefits and then sell the food to friends at a discount to get cash. Other times they approach strangers in grocery stores, offering to use their Quest cards in exchange for cash - completing the deal in the parking lot and pocketing $50 for every $100 they spend in Quest funds for the strangers’ groceries. In other cases, recipients fail to report all their income or that a working spouse lives in the home. Some collect money from multiple states. Lax rules and oversight make the program susceptible to fraud…”

When the next meal is a maybe, By Renée C. Lee, April 25, 2011, Houston Chronicle: “Every day more than 700,000 people in Harris County are uncertain about where they will get their next meal. Not all of them are poor - many are working people who don’t qualify for federal food programs. These are among the findings of a recent study that provides the first detailed look at hunger at the county level. Harris County families struggling to keep food on the table have a food budget shortfall of $12.97 per week, per person. To fill the meal gap, $277 million is needed annually to ensure that every person has three meals a day, according to the report’s calculations. The federal government defines food insecurity as limited or uncertain availability of nutritionally adequate foods. On average, food insecure families go at least seven months of the year without enough food, the study said. The study, based on 2009 figures, was conducted by Feeding America, a national hunger relief organization, with the goal of helping local food banks develop better strategies to target hunger. Food banks traditionally have relied on state and national data to estimate food insecurity needs, but the new county data give them a more accurate assessment…”

Youth, mobility and poverty help drive cellphone-only status, By Sabrina Tavernise, April 20, 2011, New York Times: “It’s not quite the stuff of bragging rights, but Arkansas and Mississippi find themselves at the top of a new state ranking: They have the highest concentrations of people in the nation who have abandoned landlines in favor of cellular phones. At the other extreme? People in Rhode Island, Connecticut and New Jersey are still holding on to their landlines, and they have the lowest concentrations of people whose homes use only cellphones. The study, released Wednesday, was part of an annual survey conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics. Information from interviews was blended with census data to draw a map of cellular-only use by state. Its findings reflect patterns of consumer behavior that are driven by age, mobility and, in a strange twist, poverty. According to Stephen Blumberg, the researcher who conducted the study, nearly 40 percent of all adults living in poverty use only cellphones, compared with about 21 percent of adults with higher incomes…”

Lawmakers want to change welfare, but are the changes constitutional?, By Kevin Miller, April 21, 2011, Bangor Daily News: “Fixing welfare is easy enough to talk about on the campaign trail. But when it comes to actually revamping the social service programs created to help those in need, reform efforts often run up against federal restrictions, constitutional prohibitions and, in some cases, the fact that reality is different than political perception. On Monday, a legislative committee will take up a number of bills dealing with welfare, MaineCare and other social services. Although a perennial issue, welfare reform efforts gained momentum with the election last November of Gov. Paul LePage and a new Republican majority in the Legislature. LePage has pushed forward with his reform agenda by incorporating changes into his two-year, $6.1 billion budget now in the hands of the Legislature’s budget-writing committee. But lawmakers have introduced their own proposals, some more contentious than others. A few of the measures on Monday’s agenda in the Health and Human Services Committee are repeats from previous years that critics hope will suffer a similar fate…”

Child nutrition program faces cuts, By David Abel, April 16, 2011, Boston Globe: “Governor Deval Patrick and state lawmakers are proposing to slash more than 20 percent of state money from a decades-old program that helps thousands of low-income mothers afford formula and other basic foods for their children. The Women, Infants, and Children program, widely known as WIC, is regarded as a pillar of the social safety net, providing 130,000 low-income women in Massachusetts who are pregnant, breast-feeding, or raising young children with supplemental food, health care referrals, and nutrition education. Despite concerns raised by advocates for the poor, state officials said they have no choice but to make the cuts because of the state’s budget crunch…”

States seek to link public assistance, drug testing, By Ron Barnett, April 17, 2011, USA Today: “South Carolina state Sen. Harvey Peeler was at a Chamber of Commerce meeting in January when the human resources director of one of the area’s major employers, textile manufacturer Hamrick Mills, told him the company was having trouble hiring some people from the unemployment rolls. ‘They said they had potential employees that would come and apply and couldn’t pass the drug test,’ Peeler says. Peeler, a Republican who says he heard similar stories from other employers, introduced a bill Feb. 9 that would suspend unemployment checks to people who fail a drug test they must take to get a job. South Carolina is among 27 states, including Florida, Massachusetts and Arizona, to consider legislation this year that would require recipients of various kinds of public assistance to pass drug tests, according to Meagan Dorsch of the National Conference of State Legislatures…”

Study quantifies food insecurity - hunger - in the suburbs, By Alfred Lubrano, April 21, 2011, Philadelphia Inquirer: “Hunger quiets people, and there was almost no conversation among the 145 who gathered in an Upper Darby church parking lot, awaiting a charitable distribution of produce, on a recent wet spring morning. Breaking the silence, Juliana Noble said, ‘A lot of changes in my life brought me here today.’ The 50-year-old mother of a high school senior from Yeadon, Noble was laid off from her job as a course adviser at a Main Line college two years ago. She now works part-time at a clothing store, struggling to pay the mortgage and utilities. Fresh produce doesn’t fit in her budget, so she shows up at Christ Lutheran Church for the bananas, potatoes, lettuce, and other food in the weekly Fresh for All distribution by Philabundance, the hunger-relief agency…”

A village with the numbers, not the image, of the poorest place, By Sam Roberts, April 20, 2011, New York Times: “The poorest place in the United States is not a dusty Texas border town, a hollow in Appalachia, a remote Indian reservation or a blighted urban neighborhood. It has no slums or homeless people. No one who lives there is shabbily dressed or has to go hungry. Crime is virtually nonexistent. And, yet, officially, at least, none of the nation’s 3,700 villages, towns or cities with more than 10,000 people has a higher proportion of its population living in poverty than Kiryas Joel, N.Y., a community of mostly garden apartments and town houses 50 miles northwest of New York City in suburban Orange County. About 70 percent of the village’s 21,000 residents live in households whose income falls below the federal poverty threshold, according to the Census Bureau. Median family income ($17,929) and per capita income ($4,494) rank lower than any other comparable place in the country. Nearly half of the village’s households reported less than $15,000 in annual income. About half of the residents receive food stamps, and one-third receive Medicaid benefits and rely on federal vouchers to help pay their housing costs. Kiryas Joel’s unlikely ranking results largely from religious and cultural factors. Ultra-Orthodox Satmar Hasidic Jews predominate in the village; many of them moved there from Williamsburg, Brooklyn, beginning in the 1970s to accommodate a population that was growing geometrically…”

• Snyder agrees to $25 per child tax credit, By Paul Egan, April 20, 2011, Detroit News: “The Snyder administration has agreed to a House lawmaker’s proposal that would restore part of the Earned Income Tax Credit, Lt. Gov. Brian Calley said today. Calley said Gov. Rick Snyder is prepared to support a proposal from Rep. Jud Gilbert, R-Algonac, that would give a tax credit of $25 per child for families that would have been eligible for the EITC. Snyder’s Feb. 17 budget proposed eliminating the state version of the credit, which is equal to 20 percent of the federal credit for the working poor. Adding the $25-per-child credit is expected to cost about $20 million, Calley said. He said changes Snyder made to his proposal for the Homestead Property Tax Credit give another $80 million in relief to low-income earners. Eliminating the EITC is expected to save the state about $340 million. Families that received the credit received an average of $432 last year…”
• Gov. Rick Snyder agrees to restore part of Earned Income Tax Credit, By Dawson Bell, April 20, 2011, Detroit Free Press: “A new change agreed to in Gov. Rick Snyder’s plan to overhaul Michigan’s tax code would restore a portion of the Earned Income Tax Credit for the working poor, administration and legislative officials said today. The administration has agreed to give EITC-eligible income tax filers a $25/child credit, Lt. Gov. Brian Calley said in testimony before the House Tax Policy Committee. Coupled with changes to Snyder’s original proposal announced last week that more narrowly target the Homestead Tax Credit to low-income filers, the revised proposal would provide about $100 million in payments to the working poor…”

Series homepage, Star special report: Barriers make mental health treatment elusive, April 2011, Arizona Daily Star

Older workers who lost jobs in recession spend longer time without employment, By Cornelius Frolik, April 18, 2011, Dayton Daily News: “Ann Kingston, 59, has not found a steady job since moving back to the Dayton area in November, and she believes her age has played a role in her unsuccessful job hunt. Kingston said employers seem to view her and other older workers as more expensive, less capable of learning new technologies and unmotivated to work hard. Her experience is not uncommon. Although older workers have a lower unemployment rate than other segments of the population, they remain unemployed longer and their jobless rate rose by a larger percentage during the recession than their younger counterparts, according to a report released this month by the AARP Public Policy Institute. In Ohio last year, the annual
 average rate of unemployment for workers 55 and older was 6.4 percent, up from 3.54 percent in 2007, according to U.S. Census data. On average, 75,000 older workers were unemployed at any given time, an increase of 38,000 from 2007…”

Building wealth in rural America, By Ray Lopez, April 19, 2011, Daily Yonder: “Residents of rural communities face different challenges than their urban counterparts when they try to build assets or take steps to achieve financial security. The reasons are many and familiar. Rural communities have seen their share of economic struggles in recent years. Nearly one in six people living in rural America fell below the poverty line in 2009, according to U.S. Census data. Of the nearly 3 million Texas residents who were classified as rural by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service, 19.5 percent were below the poverty line. That is 3 percentage points higher than in urban Texas. Unemployment and educational attainment levels were also worse in rural Texas than in urban Texas…”

In southwest Va., as more need help, aid organization has less to give, By Eli Saslow, April 16, 2011, Washington Post: “The destitute people who line up outside her office are asking for more help than ever. The organization where she works has less than ever to give. It falls on Denise Hancock to navigate the chasm in between, so she rubs her forehead, opens her office door and calls out into the waiting room. ‘Come on in,’ she says. The first client this morning at the Pulaski Community Action office is a young woman with tangled hair and smudged eyeliner, a single mother of two who lost her job at Shoney’s restaurant. ‘You’re my last resort,’ she says, handing over a piece of paper stamped, ‘Urgent: Termination Notice.’ It is an electric bill for $510.15 with full payment due immediately. ‘Can you help me?’ she asks. Hancock purses her lips, already knowing what will come next. She punches numbers into a calculator and then begins the same conversation she will have 14 more times on this day alone. ‘I’m really sorry,’ she says. ‘All we can afford to give right now is $35…’”

State may study how N.H. cut dropouts, By James Vaznis, April 18, 2011, Boston Globe: “As Massachusetts considers raising its dropout age to 18, a similar measure enacted in New Hampshire has cut that state’s dropout rate nearly in half in its first year. The Granite State’s dropout rate has tumbled to just under 1 percent for the last school year, from 1.7 percent the previous year, when 16- and 17-year-olds could quit school without earning a diploma. ‘What we’ve done is set a goal for all students to graduate and it really has been embraced at the local level,’ said New Hampshire Governor John Lynch, who wants the dropout rate at zero by the 2012-13 school year. ‘Every school principal, teacher, and other educator is focused on how to keep students in school and find programs for them that keeps them motivated.’ Massachusetts officials say they want to find out more about New Hampshire’s strategy as they try to reduce the Bay State’s dropout rate, which has held steady at 2.9 percent for the past two years. Some cities, such as Holyoke, Lawrence, and Springfield, have rates three times higher than the state average…”

Job cuts puts seniors in jeopardy, By Shaya Tayefe Mohajer (AP), April 17, 2011, Contra Costa Times: “For $700 a month, 65-year-old Esmeralda Calderon cares for children part time through a federal community service job that’s in jeopardy because of cuts to the proposed federal budget for 2011. It’s the only source of income for a woman who has no one to rely on and lives alone in public housing in a gritty Hollywood neighborhood. Under the Department of Labor’s Senior Community Service Employment Program, more than 75,000 elderly Americans living in poverty in all 50 states earn their keep by the slimmest of margins. To qualify, participants must be over 55 and earning less than 125 percent of the federal poverty level - $13,600 a year. In the budget bill signed Friday by President Barack Obama, the program was slashed by 45 percent, from $825 million to $450 million a year. Advocates say it could mean as many as 58,000 fewer jobs if states or national groups are forced to discontinue the program because of the reductions…”

• Is stress to blame for preterm births?, By Mark Johnson and Tia Ghose, April 16, 2011, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “A tight, persistent pain in the lower abdomen chased Jasmine Zapata from class that morning, forcing her upstairs to rest on a couch at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health in Madison. It was Sept. 20, and Zapata was in her 25th week of pregnancy, just past the midpoint. She neither smoked nor drank. She knew the importance of proper prenatal care - of course she did - and had followed the doctor’s orders to the letter. Zapata, after all, was in her second year of medical school. The 23-year-old Milwaukee native had carried her first pregnancy to term and had a beautiful son to show for it: MJ, now 18 months old. At her last doctor visit the week before, all had been fine. But on this morning when Zapata rose from the couch and went into the bathroom, she saw she was bleeding. By the time the ambulance got to the hospital, she was completely dilated and in fear for her baby daughter. ‘When they were doing an ultrasound, I was mentally preparing myself,’ Zapata said. ‘What if they tell me she’s dead?’ Educated, married, with no chronic illnesses or family history of prematurity, Zapata was not, in most respects, a high risk for premature delivery, the No. 1 cause of infant mortality in Milwaukee. Only one factor suggested risk: Zapata is African-American…”
• Understanding the risks, Editorial, April 16, 2011, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “African-American babies in Milwaukee are dying before their first birthday at more than twice the rate of white infants. This tragic trend line has widened despite years of effort. Poverty, unhealthy environments, lack of prenatal care, smoking or drinking alcohol and chronic diseases such as diabetes all play a role. But researchers now believe that something else is behind these cruel numbers: the accumulated stress of a life lived as a racial minority. This insight argues for approaches that help black women understand the multiple risks they face and that give them tools to cope with these risks. Milwaukee’s black infant mortality rate was 15.7 deaths per 1,000 live births between 2005 and 2008, one of the worst rates in the country and double the rate for white babies…”

Republicans revive 1990s-era welfare debate over food stamps, suggest overhauling program, Associated Press, April 18, 2011, Washington Post: “House Republicans resurrected a 1990s-era fight over food stamps in their budget approved last week, arguing that any serious attempt to cut spending must include an overhaul of government programs that help needy families pay for food. Congress already has started cutting some food programs, including reducing the Women, Infants and Children Program by $500 million as part of a deal on this year’s budget. And last year, more than $2 billion in future funding for food stamps was redirected to other programs. On Friday, the House approved a Republican proposal to overhaul the $65 billion food stamp program - known officially as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP - by replacing it with capped block grants to states, which would pay for the aid but make it contingent on work or job training. That proposal was included in a 2012 budget plan put forward by Budget Committee Chairman Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis…”

Federal Medicaid teams deployed to help states cut costs get mixed reviews, By Christopher Weaver, April 13, 2011, Kaiser Health News: “Earlier this year, governors — both Republicans and Democrats — asked the federal Department of Health and Human Services for greater freedom in bending Medicaid rules to make it easier to narrow gaping state budget deficits. The department demurred, but offered the states teams of experts to search for savings within the current rules. The teams, HHS said at the time, would be deployed to states that asked for help on Medicaid, the state-federal program for the poor and disabled. Nearly half the states took HHS up on its offer, according to newly released information from HHS…”

Newly empowered GOP pushes voter ID, By John Gramlich, April 14, 2011, Stateline.org: “Fresh off commanding electoral victories in November, Republican majorities in many state legislatures want to require voters to show photo identification at the polls, a move Democrats say is cynically designed to help the GOP during the next election cycle. Voter identification laws have been a demarcation line between Democrats and Republicans for years. Democrats claim the measures disenfranchise poor, elderly and minority voters who tend to vote Democratic but may not have appropriate photo ID. Republicans say the laws are necessary to prevent fraud, particularly when important statewide contests - such as the 2008 election for the U.S. Senate in Minnesota - can be decided by just hundreds of votes…”

Beyond ’surviving’: Defining economic security, April 14, 2011, National Public Radio: “As President Obama and members of Congress debate national budgets, Shawn McMahon has been calculating individual and family budgets. He’s the research director for Wider Opportunities for Women, a group that works with low-income women and families. The nonprofit group just released its Basic Economic Security Tables index, which measures the minimum income workers need to achieve basic economic security…”

Illinois House OKs studying cost of ID photos on food stamp cards, By Dave McKinney and Stephen Di Benedetto, April 13, 2011, Chicago Sun-Times: “After a stormy debate, the Illinois House voted Tuesday to commission a study on how expensive it would be to put photos on the ATM-like cards used for food stamps and cash assistance. Designed to combat fraud, the legislation, which passed 64-48 and now moves to the Senate, would give the Department of Human Services six months to report back to the Legislature with an estimate and to figure out how caregivers could buy groceries for their clients with so-called Link cards bearing the clients’ photos…”

• Study: Prisons failing to deter repeat criminals in 41 states, By Kevin Johnson, April 12, 2011, USA Today: “The number of inmates returning to state prisons within three years of release has remained steady for more than a decade, a strong indicator that prison systems are failing to deter criminals from re-offending, a new study has concluded. In one of the most comprehensive reports of its kind, the Pew Center on the States found that slightly more than four in 10 offenders return to prison within three years, a collective rate that has remained largely unchanged in years, despite huge increases in prison spending that now costs states $52 billion annually. National recidivism, or return, rates are holding steady even as state officials have launched programs to help prisoners re-enter society and as the recent financial crisis has forced states to cut their budgets and re-evaluate the types of offenders who should return to prison…”
• Study praises efforts in Missouri, Kansas to cut prison recidivism, By Mark Morris, April 12, 2011, Kansas City Star: “A new study on former prisoners who reoffend and return to prison gives Missouri high marks for a ‘dramatic’ decline in recidivism over the last six years. According to the Pew Center on the States, 46 percent of Missouri offenders released in fiscal year 2004 returned to prison within two years, for either a new crime or for a ‘technical’ violation of their parole or probation. However, that figure had dropped nearly 9 percentage points, to 37.5 percent, for offenders released in fiscal 2008, according to state figures…”
• Va. returning prisoners to jail at lower-than-average rate, study shows, By Michael S. Rosenwald, April 13, 2011, Washington Post: “Sixteen years after banning parole, Virginia has defied the nation’s unshakably high recidivism level, returning a lower rate of prisoners to incarceration than many other states, according to the first state-by-state comparison of recidivism. Although the state’s recidivism levels have edged up slightly since 2000, Virginia’s 28.3 percent recidivism rate for prisoners in the three years after their release in 2004 is well below the nation’s 43.3 percent rate during the same period, according to the Pew Center on the States study…”
• Four in 10 offenders released from prison return, survey finds, By Jessie Halladay, April 12, 2011, Louisville Courier-Journal: “Four in 10 offenders released from prisons across the nation are back behind bars within three years, according to a report released Tuesday by the Pew Center on the States, the first ever state-by-state survey on inmate recidivism. According to state corrections data collected by Pew, 43 percent of prisoners released in 2004 and 45 percent of those released in 1999 were reincarcerated within three years, despite falling crime rates and rising corrections budgets…”

As enrollments soar and state aid vanishes, community colleges reconsider their role, By David Harrison, april 11, 2011, Stateline.org: “Jud Hicks got the email late one evening in January. The following day, it said, the state House of Representatives would release a budget proposal cutting off all state money to four community colleges. One of those was Frank Phillips College, a small school in the Panhandle town of Borger, where Hicks has been the president since early this year. ‘We had no idea,’ he recalls. ‘You had students saying, what do I do? I guess my grades won’t transfer.’ News reports suggested that without state funding, the four community colleges would have no choice but to close. In Borger, a windy plains town of 13,000 people, where oil refineries and chemical plants are the main employers, that would be a devastating outcome. But the impact would be felt well beyond Borger. If Frank Phillips College were to close, the residents of a 9,300 square-mile area - roughly the size of New Hampshire - would be left without a single college or university. That scenario no longer seems likely…”

• Bill voiding sick leave law sent to Walker, By Patrick Marley, April 12, 2011, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “Milwaukee’s ordinance requiring businesses to provide paid sick leave would be voided under a bill Assembly Republicans sent Gov. Scott Walker on Tuesday. Walker said he is likely to sign the measure. The city’s sick leave ordinance was overwhelmingly approved by voters in 2008 but has never gone into effect because of legal challenges. The Assembly voted 59-35 to ensure it would never be implemented. ‘This bill is a slap in the face to the people of the City of Milwaukee,’ said Rep. Christine Sinicki (D-Milwaukee). ‘This was not just some fluke referendum. This was a hard-fought campaign. People were well educated on both sides.’ But Republicans said the sick leave ordinance would cost Milwaukee business. Changing state law would allow employers to expand and hire more workers, they said…”
• Patrick aide gives backing to proposal for paid sick days, By Kyle Cheney, April 13, 2011, Boston Globe: “Governor Deval Patrick’s top labor adviser threw the administration’s weight behind a proposal yesterday that would require employers to allow workers to earn seven paid sick days a year, calling the proposal a ‘basic right.’ Joanne Goldstein, secretary of labor and workforce development, argued that the plan would enhance workplace productivity, and rejected assertions that sick leave policies should be left up to individual businesses. But at a State House briefing on the issue, flanked by members of the Paid Leave Coalition and supportive lawmakers, Goldstein went further…”

• Families would keep child-care subsidies in Kasich’s budget, By Joe Vardon, April 12, 2011, Columbus Dispatch: “Mixed in with about 20 children reaching toward the sky and touching their toes yesterday was Gov. John Kasich, who tried to mirror the youngsters as they went through their stretching routine. With his own toes just out of reach, Kasich resigned himself to cheering on the children before continuing his tour of the YMCA Early Learning Center, 2879 Johnstown Rd., in Columbus. Kasich’s visit was used to highlight the provisions in his two-year, $55.5 billion budget proposal that would allow all children now enrolled in state-subsidized child-care programs to remain despite a 7 percent reduction in funds for child-care providers…”
• Child-care subsidies reduced in Missouri Senate plan, By David A. Lieb (AP), April 12, 2011, Columbia Missourian: “Thousands of low-income Missouri parents would see their state child care subsidies reduced under a budget plan a state Senate committee passed Tuesday. The plan would reduce monthly child-care subsidies for about 6,600 children while extending benefits to an estimated 570 children whose parents currently earn too much to qualify for state-subsidized care. The changes would save about $1 million in the proposed $23 billion operating budget for next year approved by the Senate Appropriations Committee. But the panel chairman, Sen. Kurt Schaefer, said the greater goal is to provide a less-abrupt phase-out of benefits for working parents who get promotions and pay raises…”

S.F. doubles hiring subsidy to cut welfare rolls, By John Coté, April 12, 2011, San Francisco Chronicle: “San Francisco, facing a looming $306 million budget deficit, is willing to pay private companies to hire people off the city’s welfare rolls. On Monday, the city doubled its subsidy to $5,000 per employee because so few companies were taking advantage of the current local economic stimulus program…”

In some states, working poor could pay more taxes, By Pam Fessler, April 11, 2011, National Public Radio: “Several states want to scale back or eliminate a tax credit for the working poor, as they try to balance their budgets. Anti-poverty groups say some of these same states also want to cut taxes for businesses. Governors say they’re trying to balance the need to promote jobs with deficit reduction. But advocates say the poor are being asked to bear an unfair share of the burden. The tax break is called an earned income tax credit, or EITC. About half the states offer residents an EITC on top of a similar credit available from the federal government…”

• GOP governors say they have a recipe for recovery, By Noam N. Levey, April 12, 2011, Los Angeles Times: “In their drive to cut medical assistance to the poor while pushing tax breaks benefiting the affluent, congressional Republicans are following the lead of a group of governors who have championed this approach to balance state budgets. The strategy - reprising the supply-side economics of the Ronald Reagan era - has caught on with conservatives who say that lowering taxes for corporations and wealthy taxpayers will boost state economies. But the moves are sparking a debate in capitols from Arizona to Wisconsin to Maine over who is being asked to sacrifice and whether the strategy will produce more jobs…”
• Lawsuit filed over Basic Health cuts to poor people, By Vanessa Ho, April 8, 2011, Seattle Post-Intelligencer: “A potential class-action lawsuit has been filed against Washington over budget cuts to Basic Health, a month after the state booted 17,000 people off the subsidized health-care program to save money. In reducing its rolls, the Health Care Authority deemed certain categories of people as ineligible, including kids, seniors, undocumented U.S. residents and people who made too much money. Also disqualified were legal immigrants who hadn’t lived in the country for at least five years. The complaint, filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Seattle, accuses the state of violating the Constitution’s ‘Equal Protection Clause,’ by disqualifying some legal immigrants, while still serving other legal immigrants and citizens…”

• Obstacles seen in poor areas for new farmers’ markets, By Diane Cardwell, April 11, 2011, New York Times: “For years, the Bloomberg administration has labored to improve the eating habits of New Yorkers, banning trans fats from restaurants, urging food purveyors to use less salt and creating special zoning to encourage fresh-food supermarkets to open in produce-poor neighborhoods. But the city still puts roadblocks in the way of community groups seeking to open farmers’ markets in low-income neighborhoods, says a report to be released on Tuesday by the Manhattan borough president, Scott M. Stringer. Those efforts face excessive fees, confusing rules and a lack of coordination among agencies, the report says…”
• Coming to a vacant lot near you, the neighborhood farm, By Madeleine Baran, April 7, 2011, Minnesota Public Radio: “Farmers looking for land to grow food to sell may have another option. A plan to expand urban agriculture in Minneapolis passed the city’s zoning and planning committee on Thursday, opening the door for farmers to turn vacant lots into commercial farms. Minneapolis is already home to community gardens and farmers markets, but the city lacked definitions or regulations of land used to grow and sell food. Urban agriculture supporters said that made it impossible to get approval for innovative farming projects. Similar plans have been adopted in Cleveland, Seattle, Portland, Philadelphia, Chicago, Kansas City, Oakland and Detroit…”

Colorado’s poorest counties face the highest rate of teen pregnancy, By Karen Auge, April 10, 2011, Denver Post: “At 2 in the afternoon on a recent Tuesday, Lexie Parker lay on the couch in her tidy, three-room Walsenburg apartment, cuddling her 16-month-old daughter, Tazia. One skinny stream of sunlight squeezed into a room otherwise darkened by a blanket tacked over the window. Tazia giggled at the furry monster and his little green counterpart as the sounds of ‘Monsters, Inc.’ filled the room. ‘This is it; this is our life,’ Parker said…”

Senate offers deal on Missouri jobless benefits, By Virginia Young, April 8, 2011, St. Louis Post-Dispatch: “A logjam holding up extended unemployment benefits broke Thursday when Senate Republicans crafted a compromise that aims to cut other federal stimulus spending to send Washington a message about the deficit. Under the deal, senators agreed to extend benefits temporarily for longtime jobless Missourians by 20 weeks, at an estimated cost to the federal government of $105 million. As a tradeoff, the Senate intends to eliminate $250 million in already approved stimulus projects, such as grants and loans to make homes more energy-efficient and to improve municipal wastewater treatment systems. Senators also added a new provision, sought by business groups. Missouri employers would pay for 20 weeks instead of 26 weeks of unemployment benefits for future workers. Supporters said that change would help Missouri employers by offsetting higher taxes they will owe next year to pay back $800 million in federal loans that have kept the state’s unemployment fund afloat. Michigan recently took a similar step…”

Minimum wage debate gains momentum in Md., By Lorraine Mirabella, April 10, 2011, Baltimore Sun: “Bridget Highkin works as hard now as she did two years ago. But then she brought home $800 a week from her waitressing job and today she’s lucky to clear $300. For now - until she completes a part-time nursing program and can find a job as a nurse - financial relief for her family hinges on a proposal to increase Maryland’s hourly minimum wage from $7.25 to $9.75 over three years. A few more dollars an hour would allow her to stop receiving assistance for day care and food, Highkin says. ‘I live just under paycheck to paycheck,’ said Highkin, 25, who works at a Cracker Barrel restaurant in Bel Air and is a single mother of two. ‘At the end of each week, I’m scraping together my last pennies in hopes that the next week I can do it again.’ Proponents of the minimum wage increase see momentum growing in its favor. Though proposed legislation has gone nowhere in the General Assembly session that ends Monday, backers say they have built support for another try next year. They also say low wages are dragging down not only individuals and their families but the broader economic recovery…”

• Medicaid to offer rewards for healthy behavior, By Aimee Miles, April 8, 2011, Kaiser Health News: “A federal grant program authorized in the health overhaul law is offering states $100 million to reward Medicaid recipients who make an effort to quit smoking or keep their weight, blood pressure or cholesterol levels in check. The grant program is meant to encourage states, many of which are under pressure to cut Medicaid costs, to experiment with an uncertain approach to wellness: offering incentives for healthy behavior. ‘Medicaid is almost the sweet spot for financial rewards,’ said George Loewenstein, a behavioral economist at Carnegie Mellon University who has studied the effect of financial incentives on behavior. Medicaid recipients, he explains, are economically disadvantaged and have more to gain from incentives. Loewenstein, however, is dubious about whether incentives, especially those tied to weight loss, could really work. He’s not alone. Behavioral incentive programs have shown some promise in specific settings, but they are largely untested in the Medicaid population…”
• State seeks ways to stretch Medicaid dollars, By Trip Jennings, April 4, 2011, Santa Fe New Mexican: “New Mexico smokers who rely on Medicaid might rethink that next cigarette. The same goes for that sugary pastry. Like other states struggling to find ways to stretch dollars spent on health care for the poor, New Mexico is seeking ways to save money on the fast-expanding government insurance program. Encouraging Medicaid enrollees to take more responsibility for their own health issues is likely to be part of the discussion. Last month, New Mexico’s human services agency quietly issued a 61-page document inviting bidders to contemplate ways to redesign Medicaid, which serves roughly one in four New Mexicans. Among the issues the state Human Services Department highlighted when seeking proposals from interested firms is changing the responsibilities of Medicaid enrollees for such things as cost sharing and healthy behaviors…”

Children who are poor readers face higher risk of drop-out, study shows, By Lori Higgins, April 8, 2011, Detroit Free Press: “Children who can’t read well by third grade, and those who live in poverty, are more likely to drop out or not finish high school on time, according to the results of long-term research released today. The national report, commissioned by the Annie E. Casey Foundation, is based on a study of nearly 4,000 students who were born between 1979 and 1989. Researchers followed them through the years, surveying their parents every two years to find out their family’s economic status and other factors, according to a news release from the foundation…”

Wage for Ind. servers among the lowest in the US, By Dana Hunsinger Benbow, April 8, 2011, Indianapolis Star: “Customers ask for ice water with lemon. And then more lemons. Oh, yes. Some sugar, too, please. They ask to split a meal - half the sandwich with mayonnaise and tomato, the other with mustard and onion. Make that a Caesar salad on one plate and fries, no salt, on the other. When it’s all said and done and the meal is over, waiter Thomas Ievoli said he’s at his tipping point. Unfortunately, his customers aren’t. ‘People are expecting more service and paying less for it,’ said Ievoli, a server at Old Pointe Tavern and a bartender at Lockerbie Pub. ‘They do all kinds of special requests. They will sit there forever. They special-order and then tip you 10 percent - if not less.’ In the economic downturn, lower tips have made it tough for waiters and bartenders to survive. In Indiana, it’s especially tough because it, along with 17 other states, has the lowest minimum wage for people who depend on tips in the nation: the federal standard of $2.13 an hour. While the federal minimum wage has steadily increased over the years to $7.25 an hour, the $2.13 mark for tipped employees has remained in place since 1991…”

Forget unemployment extensions, cutbacks more likely, By Sara Murray, April 5, 2011, Wall Street Journal: “State attempts to pare back unemployment and an improving economy are likely to lead to a much shorter span of unemployment benefits next year. A combination of state and federal programs has offered up to 99 weeks of unemployment benefits to jobless Americans in the recession and subsequent recovery. That coverage is beginning to unwind as cash-strapped states move to reduce their share of benefits and other states become ineligible for federal programs…”

Health coverage for $240 a month, By Warren Wolfe, April 6, 2011, Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune: “In a pioneering bid to streamline the state’s big health insurance programs, the Legislature’s new Republican majority is poised to give thousands of low-income Minnesotans vouchers to buy coverage in the private marketplace. Republicans say the voucher plan, contained in a huge budget bill under debate Wednesday in the House, would cap the state’s liability, treat low-income people with respect by giving them responsibility for their own care, and unleash the power of competition to contain rising health care costs…”

Teen pregnancy rate drops to a record low, CDC reports, By Linda Shrieves, April 5, 2011, Orlando Sentinel: “The teen pregnancy rate in the United States fell in 2009 to a record low - part of a 37 percent decline over the past 20 years. And though that sounds like cause for celebration, here’s the more depressing side of those statistics: Teen pregnancy rates here are as much as nine times higher than in other developed countries, according to the latest CDC Vital Signs report. The report, which covers teen pregnancy rates from 1991 to 2009, found that more than 400,000 teen girls give birth each year in the U.S…”

• In Pa. budget fight, would cutting welfare lessen the impact of cuts to education?, By Angela Couloumbis, April 7, 2011, Philadelphia Inquirer: “Cutting welfare to save higher education: How much would it really save? The corridors of the Capitol were reverberating this week with chants of students and teachers (’We are . . . Penn State!’) decrying the deep cuts Gov. Corbett wants to make in aid to state-funded universities. So it made sense for the brain trust of the House’s new Republican majority to give serious consideration to somehow softening those blows. And for one brief shining moment, that brain trust seemed to have it figured out: save millions by rooting out fraud and waste in the welfare department. Use the savings to put back some of the aid Corbett wants to take from the big ’state-related’ universities (Pennsylvania State, Temple, Lincoln, Pittsburgh) and 14 smaller state-supported schools such as West Chester and Kutztown. Problem is, the House Republicans are still doing the math on just how much money their plan to root out welfare waste will actually save…”
• Welfare targeted to spare higher ed, By Brad Bumsted and Timothy Puko, April 7, 2011, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review: “The Department of Public Welfare’s proposed $11.2 billion budget, the largest area of spending in state government, remains a target of House Republicans as they attempt to restore some of Gov. Tom Corbett’s recommended cuts in higher education. But GOP leaders acknowledged at a news conference on Wednesday that the package of eight bills they were touting would not have a significant impact on the 2011-12 budget in which Corbett is trying to close a $4.2 billion deficit… “
• Pa. social services sweating over major budget blow, By Jeremy Roebuck, April 7, 2011, Philadelphia Inquirer: “With the effects of a recession lingering, no one providing government or social services expected to escape this year’s budgeting process unscathed. But Gov. Corbett’s proposal to eliminate a fund directed toward helping families hardest hit by the economic downturn has some area nonprofits scratching their heads. The governor’s proposed budget - released last month - calls for zeroing out the $23 million Human Services Development Fund, an account that helps counties fill gaps in their social-services spending on those who fall outside typically protected groups such as children and the disabled. Yet the cuts couldn’t come at a worse time, nonprofit managers say, as the recession has put more families in need of such help and restricted the amount of private money available to support them…”

Unemployment rates fall in more than 75 percent of metro areas due to widespread job gains, By Christopher S. Rugaber (AP), April 6, 2011, Los Angeles Times: “Unemployment rates are falling in most metro areas across the country, suggesting that recent nationwide gains in hiring are widespread and not limited to a few healthy regions. More than three-quarters of the nation’s 372 largest metro areas reported lower unemployment rates in February than the previous month, the Labor Department said Wednesday. That’s the most to report a decline since September. And more than 300 areas added jobs in February compared to the previous month. That’s a much better showing than January, when most metro areas lost jobs…”