DATE: Wednesday, August 27, 1997            TAG: 9708270027

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B12  EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: OPINION 

SOURCE: BY ROBERT C. METCALF 

                                            LENGTH:   80 lines

WELFARE MOMS AND KIDS BENEFIT FROM REFORM

I read with interest Brenda McCormick's Another View (Aug. 15) in which she anticipates the failure of welfare reform. Ms. McCormick's critique is reminiscent of rhetoric from 20 years ago designed to shift blame onto society for the plight of the poor.

The new reality is that welfare reform is working well. Consider the following statistics:

Virginia's welfare caseload has plummeted more than 31 percent since Governor Allen signed the welfare reform bill in 1995, reversing a trend of 8 percent annual increases.

More than 8,000 current recipients are working, with total earnings over $20 million.

Nearly 70 percent of the caseload is working for their benefits, a 300 percent increase over the former welfare system.

In the past two years, taxpayers have saved $57 million.

Almost 1,000 families were diverted from welfare with one-time payments to overcome an immediate obstacle, such as housing costs or automobile repair.

Among babies born to welfare recipients, Virginia has achieved a 98.5 percent rate of paternity identification, the highest in the country.

Virginia is collecting child support from noncustodial parents at record rates, increasing collection 32 percent since 1995. This translates into $74 million more for Virginia's children.

Virginia law now requires minor children of welfare recipients to stay in school, and 99 percent have complied.

The work requirement of welfare reform is so successful that Governor Allen accelerated its implementation by 18 months. The Hampton Roads area will begin requiring able-bodied recipients to work as of Oct. 1.

It's important to analyze Ms. McCormick's charges of program failure one by one.

1. Ms. McCormick calls social service professionals ``confused'' government workers who can't figure out how to do their own jobs, much less assist welfare recipients. Yet Virginia's social workers are leading the charge in welfare reform and helping thousands of clients to self-sufficiency. Chief among their accomplishments is assisting 69 percent of able-bodied welfare recipients to find work within 90 days. In Hampton Roads, the five social services departments have recruited hundreds of business partners, including the Chamber of Commerce, rallied dozens of churches and civic groups and crafted careful plans for child care and transportation.

2. Ms. McCormick says localities spend money in an ill-advised fashion and do not help families achieve independence. This presumption ignores incredible local innovations. Examples abound. One Northern Virginia locality partnered with a local employer to assist in developing an on-site child-care program. In Washington County, the local department of social services is leasing cars to welfare recipients so they can get to work. In the Richmond area, 16 churches combined to provide work readiness training to 25 welfare recipients. Within 30 days of completion, 19 participants had jobs. In addition to local resources, Virginia gives all communities the extra transportation, child care and job-finding money to make welfare reform work.

3. Ms. McCormick's third attack is on businesses, churches and nonprofits, for being too short-sighted to take a role in welfare reform. But more than 1,100 employers have hired more than 8,000 welfare recipients, more than 93 percent of these into unsubsidized jobs. More than 2,000 churches in Virginia are providing mentoring, job readiness training and transportation and child-care assistance. The community is the engine that drives welfare reform, not the roadblock in the path.

Ms. McCormick pleads for an end to the bashing of welfare recipients. Who is bashing recipients? Not the social workers now empowering recipients, not the thousands of businesses now hiring them, not the faith community now ministering to them and not Gov. George Allen, Virginia's chief welfare reformer. To a group of business leaders in Charlottesville, Governor Allen said, ``It is good for the soul of the commonwealth of Virginia to encourage Virginians to take an active role in helping their neighbors (through welfare reform to) achieve self-sufficiency.''

I am very proud of the hard work of social service professionals, communities and welfare recipients. Welfare moms and kids, and taxpayers, are the beneficiaries of this new system. Fortunately, the Hampton Roads area can look at the rest of Virginia and anticipate that welfare reform will work to make our community stronger. MEMO: Robert C. Metcalf is state secretary of Health and Human

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