Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, May 25, 1995 TAG: 9505250075
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-3 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
For months, Allen's aides have said the plan would place about 49,000 of 74,000 welfare recipients - roughly two-thirds of the state caseload - in private business or community service jobs.
But according to documents obtained this week by The Washington Post, state budget analysts privately projected that 26,000 people actually would go to work by 1999.
Allen used the higher figures to portray his welfare overhaul as the toughest and most ambitious in the nation.
But Martin Brown, an assistant to Secretary of Health and Human Resources Kay Coles James, said officials in December projected the lower figure when the Allen plan was unveiled.
``This is not a new report,'' Brown said Wednesday. ``This is something that we have been saying all along.''
Brown said that while 49,000 public aid recipients will be required to work for their benefits, about 23,000 people are expected to drop off public assistance or move out of state.
Critics of the Allen plan have complained that the administration has played fast and loose with the numbers.
``From this administration, it really doesn't surprise me at all,'' said Del. David Brickley of Woodbridge, one of the leading advocates of welfare revision among Democratic state legislators. ``I let some of these numbers go in one ear and out the other. ... I take it all with a grain of salt.''
Sen. Joseph Gartlan Jr., D-Fairfax County, perhaps the staunchest opponent of Allen's welfare program, called the administration's public figures ``ideologically inspired guesswork.''
``I've been very skeptical of their numbers in the first place, because I don't know what methodology they're using to get them,'' Gartlan said.
The Allen administration says it saw no need to explain the different figures.
``I don't think that that changes anything about the program,'' Allen spokesman Ken Stroupe said. ``It is the most comprehensive and most sweeping welfare-to-work program of any in the nation. It is a statement of fact that 48,548 people will be required to work.''
But many of those required to find jobs never will do so, he acknowledged, and if they choose to leave the welfare rolls, so be it.
``Ultimately, government cannot require people to work,'' Stroupe said. ``That will be their decision.''
by CNB