Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, July 10, 1994 TAG: 9407100046
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LESLIE TAYLOR STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Felicia White used to get angry at people on welfare, angry that people would be content to let a monthly check govern their lives.
Angry, until she became one of those people, forced by circumstances to join the thousands of Virginians on the welfare rolls.
Now she is on the inside, clued into what works in the welfare system - and what doesn't. Too many mandates, she says. Too many rules. Too little support for recipients while they are trying to get off welfare.
Now she is in a position to help cure the system's ills - and to ensure that what is good about it doesn't get lost in bureaucracy.
White, 22, of Roanoke, is the youngest member of the Governor's Commission on Citizen Empowerment, appointed by Gov. George Allen two months ago to build on welfare reforms enacted by the General Assembly this year.
Allen signed into law a plan that would impose a two-year limit on Aid to Families with Dependent Children benefits in exchange for job training, child care, transportation and health care. Participants would be required to seek private-sector jobs within a year of going on welfare rolls or to take public service jobs.
Of the 40 commission members - most of them legislators, businesspeople and community leaders - White is one of seven who are current or former welfare recipients.
"There are a lot of important people on the commission - politicians, government officials," she said. "But to me, they don't have the outlook that I do. It's a totally different thing once you've been there."
The commission was given eight months to devise a plan that requires able-bodied welfare recipients to work for their benefits, provides day care to single parents and includes incentives for getting off - and staying off - welfare rolls.
Since June, the commission has held four town meetings across the state. On Wednesday, the fifth and final will be held in Roanoke.
White was concerned at first that her commission appointment was merely for show. She quashed any inkling of that notion the first time she opened her mouth at a commission meeting.
The group was listening to presentations about several community service programs. One was about Responsible Fathers, a program that claimed a 95 percent success rate. Commission members discussed bringing the program to Alexandria, Richmond and Norfolk, White said.
"I said, `Excuse me, Roanoke has the highest teen pregnancy rate in the state. Why not bring the program to Roanoke first as a pilot project, then take it to the bigger cities?' " White said. "They looked like they were surprised something intelligent came out of my mouth.
"And I wanted to say, `That's why I'm here. You all need a fresh new view.' "
Kay Coles James, Virginia's secretary of health and human resources, met White during a swing through Roanoke in March. White was among several women who spoke to James about Project Self-Sufficiency, a Roanoke Department of Social Services program that helps people who receive public assistance move into economic independence through education and job training.
White impressed James, said Martin Brown, James' assistant.
"She was candid, articulate and she was confident," said Brown, who accompanied James on that Roanoke visit. "Even though [White] had been through some tough times personally, she had the mentality of a survivor as opposed to a victim."
White abhors the victim's mentality. She is less than forgiving of people who stay on welfare rolls for years without making the effort to wean themselves from government handouts.
White was three months pregnant when she graduated from Patrick Henry High School in 1991. Three weeks after giving birth to her son, Christopher, she went to work full time.
She moved into her own apartment. She paid the rent, the bills, cared for her son. She refused to go on welfare.
"I didn't want to be a slave of [Aid to Families with Dependent Children] and public assistance," White said. "I always thought of people on AFDC as being bad or lazy, and I just didn't want to do that."
Then White emptied her bank account into a job with a company that offered false promises of management opportunity. The company, she says, gave her nothing in return.
She was broke. Her mother persuaded her to apply for public assistance.
"I didn't want to go," she said. "But I got off my big high horse and applied."
White received AFDC benefits, food stamps, Section 8 housing assistance, child-care benefits. But a social worker also asked what she would do with her life if she had a choice.
White, who had to pass up college scholarships when she became pregnant, told the social worker that she would go back to school. The social worker promised to make it possible.
"I cried and cried and cried," White said. "I was so happy that someone was helping me and not taking from me. I had heard so many bad things about the welfare system. But I finally found someone who really cared about what was going on with me, or at least that's the way she made me feel."
In January 1992, White was accepted into Project Self-Sufficiency. She enrolled in Virginia Western Community College.
"She is one of the most enthusiastic people I know," said Suzanne Bell, the project's case worker. "She is really interested in achieving her goal and being able to help others after her goal has been achieved. I have other clients who are probably just as motivated but don't have the enthusiasm and drive that she seems to have."
In May, White graduated from Virginia Western with an associate's degree in mental health. This fall, she will begin working on a bachelor's degree in social work through a Radford University program offered at the Virginia Western campus.
"I think a lot of people don't know how to get ahead and off the system," White said. "So many girls don't know they can go to school if they want to."
But the welfare system also must be supportive, White said.
"Those are the things the commission is going to try to change, trying to get benefits to people who are trying to do better," she said. "Why cancel somebody's food stamps when they're just getting a new job? As soon as they start a job, the benefits go down. If your baby gets sick, what are you going to do without Medicaid?"
White is not completely free of the welfare system. Though she isn't receiving benefits this summer while working as a student counselor for Roanoke College's Upward Bound program, she must return to the welfare rolls before classes start this fall to receive child-care benefits, she said.
The system, she says, is fraught with unnecessary mandates.
"For instance, with child care and education, if they're going to make AFDC for two years and off, they need to do child care for two years and off," she said. "They have all these rules and regulations but don't look at the effects of things like that."
White and her son's father have been together for seven years. They want to marry but "if we did, all my benefits would go down the drain," she said.
"The system is saying, `If you want to be married, your husband should be able to take care of you.' But he doesn't make enough to support him, myself and our son. Hopefully, one day, we can get married. But right now, we'd have to pay to have a family."
White does not see herself as having done anything outstanding. She says she merely set strict goals for herself and adhered to them.
Welfare, she says, is only "a way to get from point A to point B."
"That's what it should be," she said. "If it can help you in that era, it's good. I think that's why we need it.
"But if you're stuck in that middle place, and you're not trying to get to point B, then I think you should get kicked off of it. It's a shame that you have to force people to make a change to better their lives."
Governor's Commission on Citizen Empowerment will hold a town meeting Wednesday from 6 8 p.m. at the Roanoke Civic Center. People who wish to speak should register in advance by calling (800) 562-4694.
by CNB