November-December 2011 Clearinghouse Review

Articles in the November-December 2011 issue cover identification requirements for SNAP benefit recipients, employment protections for home health care workers, how health reform will affect home- and community-based services, using the Equal Credit Opportunity Act to challenge and prevent foreclosure, and more.

Advocacy Story: Amending the Illinois Wage Payment and Collection Act: An Organizing Victory Against Wage Theft

By Alvar Ayala
Advocacy Story: A Victory for Collaborative Advocacy: Odems v. New York City Department of Education

By Bernadette Jentsch
Advocacy Story: Left High and Dry: Water Utility Shutoffs and Tenants in Foreclosed Properties

By Purvi Shah
Advocacy Story: Advocates and Community Groups Defeat Punitive Housing Authority Proposals

By Marie Claire Tran Leung and Elizabeth Rosenthal
How the Fair Labor Standards Act Fails Home Health Aides and Consumers
Home health aides perform some of America’s most difficult work, and they do so without federal protections. Because home health aides are exempt from the Fair Labor Standards Act, they are not guaranteed federal minimum-wage or overtime protections even though America’s demand for qualified home health aides is exploding as our population ages. The exemption of home health aides from Fair Labor Standards Act coverage has severe consequences not only for workers but also for consumers, and advocates across the country are working to improve home health aides’ wages in courtrooms and legislatures.

Copies of this article are available for individual purchase online for $15 apiece.

Related Articles
- David T. Hutt, Ensuring Fair Wages? Subminimum Wages for Individuals with Disabilities Under the Fair Labor Standards Act (May-June 2011)
- Rebecca Smith, Cynthia Mark, and Anita Sinha, Protecting the Labor and Employment Rights of Immigrant Workers (Sept.-Oct. 2004)
- William P. Quigley, Primer on Minimum-Wage and Overtime Issues Under the Fair Labor Standards Act for Low-Wage Workers and Their Advocates (Feb. 1996)
By Stacy Canan, Erin Morgan, and Bruce Vignery
Creating the Legal Services Organizations Our Clients Deserve: Salaries and Beyond
Civil legal services organizations and their clients will both be better off if legal services attorneys are better paid. Salary studies from several states show that salary improvements are necessary to prevent civil legal services attorneys from fleeing the public interest in favor of more lucrative work, and legal services leaders must pay attention to such data--even if they end up having smaller organizations.

Copies of this article are available for individual purchase online for $15 apiece.

Related Articles
- Wendy Pollack, The "Right to Live": Civil Legal Services and Human Rights (Sept.-Oct. 2011)
- Debra Gardner and John Pollock, Civil Right to Counsel's Relationship to Antipoverty Advocacy--Further Reflections (July-August 2011)
- Theodore O. Fillette III, Thoughts on Better Practices for Pro Bono Legal Services for Clients of Legal Services Organizations (July-August 2011)
By Kelly Carmody, Catherine Carr, Colleen Cotter, Steve Grumm, and John Tobin
How the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act Shapes the Future of Home- and Community-Based Services
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act may transform home- and community-based services in the Medicaid program. The Act shifts Medicaid long-term care away from institutionalization and toward home- and community-based services, gives states options for offering these services through their Medicaid state plans instead of through waiver programs, and promotes uniformity in consumer-focused standards for home- and community-based services.

Copies of this article are available for individual purchase online for $15 apiece.

Related Articles
- Sarah Somers & Jane Perkins, The Affordable Care Act: A Giant Step Toward Insurance Coverage for All Americans (Nov.-Dec. 2010)
- Sally Hart, Recipients of Home and Community-Based Services May Bring Section 1983 Suit to Compel Delivery of Services Under Free-Choice Provisions of Medicaid Statute (Nov.-Dec. 2007)
- Sarah Jane Somers, Cost-Related Community Integration Barriers in Medicaid: A Review of the EPSDT Program and Home and Community-Based Waivers (March-April 2002)
- Michele Melden, The Home- and Community-Based Waiver Program Under Medicaid: An Update (June 1995)
By Leonardo Cuello
Access Issues in the U.S. Supreme Court's 2010 Term: Litigation Is Not Getting Any Easier
The U.S. Supreme Court in its 2010 Term continued to throw boulders on the path to federal court, the Wal-Mart case limiting class actions being a well-known example. The justices limit access in other ways, in some cases going through contortions to arrive at an interpretation: deference cases (continued to defer to agency action) and preemption cases (preempted California law on arbitration clauses). The Court denied standing to taxpayers in an establishment clause case, with Justice Kagan dissenting from the majority’s result-oriented reasoning. However, in two employment law cases, the Court overturned lower-court rulings dismissing suits for failure to state a claim, and failure-to-state-a-claim cases did not intepret Twombly and Iqbal strictly.
Copies of this article, along with every other article published in our ongoing Federal Access Series, are available free of charge on our website.

By Gill Deford, Jane Perkins, and Gary F. Smith
i Information Interaction Interchange
Should States Allow Poor People to Use Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Benefits at Fast-Food Chains?
The alarming rise in hunger in the United States has prompted some states to authorize fast-food restaurants to accept Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits. The Restaurant Meals Program allows elderly, disabled, and homeless SNAP recipients to use their benefits in restaurants. Allowing more people to use their benefits in fast-food restaurants has incited a high-profile debate between hunger advocates and health advocates. As more states consider allowing SNAP recipients to use their benefits in fast-food restaurants, they should push fast-food restaurants to limit sodium and trans-fats in their products and increase access to healthy foods in poor neighborhoods.

Copies of this article are available for individual purchase online for $15 apiece.

Related Articles
- David A. Super, Low-Income College Students' Eligibility for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (March-April 2011)
- David A. Super, Encouraging Moderation in State Policies on Collecting Food Stamp Claims (Sept.-Oct. 2005)
- Jeremy Rosen, Rebecca Hoey, and Theresa Steed, Food Stamp and SSI Benefits: Removing Access Barriers for Homeless People (March-April 2001)
By Barbara Jones
An Emerging Issue in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program: Should Participants Be Subject to New Identification Requirements?
Several states have adopted or are considering legislation that would establish identification for recipients of Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits when the recipients use their electronic benefit transfer (EBT) cards. This legislation is apparently driven by the unfounded myth that trafficking of SNAP benefits is rampant. In reality, trafficking is a declining problem, and the photo identification requirements on EBT cards would prove costly to states.

Copies of this article are available for individual purchase online for $15 apiece.

Related Articles
- Karen K. Harris and Ji Won Kim, The Next Frontier in Public Benefits: Electronic Benefit Cards (May-June 2011)
- David A. Super, Congress Secures Private Right of Action for Low-Income Households Seeking Food Assistance (Nov.-Dec. 2010)
- David A. Super, Improving Fairness and Accuracy in Food Stamp Fraud Investigations: Advocating Reform Under Food Stamp Regulations (May-June 2005)
- Sara Simon Tompkins et al., Without Photo Identification: Barriers and Strategies (Nov.-Dec. 2003)
By Dan Lesser and Deanne Millison
Letter from the Editor
A Dream Foreclosed? Using the Equal Credit Opportunity Act to Challenge and Prevent Foreclosures
A Dream Foreclosed? Using the Equal Credit Opportunity Act to Challenge and Prevent Foreclosures,
by Jennifer D. Newton and Tamara St. Hilaire

The Equal Credit Opportunity Act forbids creditors from considering race and other prohibited factors when extending offers of credit. The Act contains antidiscriminatory provisions and notice requirements that can be used affirmatively to prevent foreclosure or as a defense in a foreclosure action. The Act can be a powerful tool in combating foreclosures resulting from subprime lending that targeted minorities and other vulnerable groups.

Copies of this article are available for individual purchase online for $15 apiece.

Related Articles
- Deanne Loonin, Race Discrimination and Consumer Law: What Legal Services Can Do to Attain Justice in the Marketplace (May-June 2002)
- Webb A. Brewer, Reverse Redlining and Civil RICO Claims Bring Large Settlement in Memphis (Jan.-Feb. 2009)
- Stuart T. Rossman, Financing Fair Driving: Race Discrimination in Retail Car Loans (July-Aug. 2002)
By Jennifer D. Newton and Tamara St. Hilaire

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