ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, December 6, 1996 TAG: 9612060036
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-13 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LESLIE TAYLOR STAFF WRITER
Social services administrators in the Roanoke and New River valleys had mixed reaction Thursday to Gov. George Allen's decision to accelerate the statewide timetable of the welfare plan's work component.
Dan Farris, director of the Montgomery County Department of Social Services, said his department had asked the state several months ago to move up the phase-in schedule.
"We were already making strides toward the concept of welfare reform," Farris said. "We actually wanted to be one of the first to go ahead with that, with the economy being fairly good at this point. We don't know what it'll be like in 1999.''
The economic development district that encompasses the Roanoke and New River valleys was scheduled to phase in the state welfare plan's work component - called VIEW for the Virginia Initiative for Employment not Welfare - on April 1, 1999. Allen announced Thursday that the new date would be Oct. 1, 1997.
Corinne Gott, superintendent of the Roanoke Department of Social Services, said the department has been moving AFDC recipients off the welfare rolls and into jobs for years. In fact, Roanoke had as many, if not more, recipients go to work in the past year than those state localities that already had phased in VIEW, she said.
Gott said VIEW will allow AFDC recipients to work and keep their benefits for two years.
But "the down side of the [VIEW] program is that at the end of two years, people won't have the [AFDC] program to fall back on," Gott said.
The state's welfare-to-work plan cuts off recipients' AFDC benefits two years after their locality phases in the VIEW program. The plan gives recipients an additional year of transitional benefits for transportation, child care and medical expenses.
The Roanoke and New River region is the largest and probably most diverse in AFDC population of the state's 18 economic development districts, said Betty McCrary, director of the Roanoke County Department of Social Services. The region has an AFDC caseload of about 3,000.
"We'll have an enormous amount of work to accomplish in the next 10 months, both within the community, private sector and business community," she said. "And we have a whole lot of work that's going to have to be done inside this office."
McCrary stressed that neither her department - nor any of the other localities' departments - can do it alone.
"We'll look to all of our community - the county, the [Roanoke County-Salem] Chamber of Commerce, the Private Industry Council, the churches and community groups - to help pick up the ball and roll with this," McCrary said. "It's the responsibility of the community to help with this as well. We need to get the community around this effort."
Mary Lou Mullis, director of the Botetourt County Department of Social Services, had only one request of the state:
"I would ask that they get us the information as soon as possible as to the impact this will have on our budget so we can incorporate this in our request to our locality. This is always a problem with us."
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