Shriver Center: December 2005

Ending the State of Poverty in America

2006-07-13T16:23:50Z

We all saw the State of Poverty when we watched the Hurricane Katrina coverage on television: people up to their armpits in water with nowhere to go and no means to get anywhere any way and no public evacuation plan for them. A public default, a government default, a collective default. The hurricane didn’t cause the State of Poverty to exist—the hurricane simply revealed it to those who willfully ignored it.

The State of Poverty was there before; it’s here now. Poverty exists in America on a huge scale—a scale that really requires sustained collective action such as community building, strategic policy-making, and government programs that secure a humane safety net for the poorest among us.

The Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law’s work—our specialty—is to devise smart solutions that involve the government in effective attacks on the State of Poverty and then to pursue strategies that make these solutions a reality.

This is not just about what low-income people need. It’s about what we all need. The State of Poverty affects all of us. It invades all of our communities. We must address it because it’s in our own interest.

A public responsibility, a government responsibility, a collective responsibility.

This sense of community compels us to secure a fair and just society for all. The Shriver Center has been working hard for the working poor. In this past year we’ve succeeded in winning three key policy advances that attack poverty among the working poor.

Margaret Stapleton wrote and successfully advocated a law that made sure working poor people get the full benefit of the recent increase in the Illinois minimum wage. The new law, for example, increases the amount of earnings that the worker may protect from creditors.

Dory Rand was one of leaders of the campaign to regulate payday lending. Too many low-income people fall prey to predatory lenders who suck their future wages and ruin their credit, locking them in the State of Poverty. In Illinois these payday transactions will now be limited and regulated, and people will have much more information before committing themselves to such lenders.

This past year the Shriver Center’s FamilyCare initiative was expanded yet again to offer health insurance to about 400,000 working parents of minor children. This is the final year of three straight years of expansion for this key strategy to support work and attack the State of Poverty.

In every community we find people who live in the State of Poverty. However, let us not simply recognize that it exists; we now must build the political will to overcome it with comprehensive and reasonable solutions. The Shriver Center will continue to lead in this cause by advocating laws and proposing model policies to benefit low-income families across the country.

Local 880 and Illinois Reach Tentative Agreement on Contract for Home Child Care Providers

2006-07-13T16:23:50Z

The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 880 and the State of Illinois have reached a tentative agreement on a contract for home child care providers. The contract would cover the more than 49,000 home child care providers who care for children participating in the state’s child care assistance program (CCAP) for low-income families. The contract covers both licensed and license-exempt home child care providers. It is the first contract of its kind in the nation.

Under the tentative 39-month agreement, home child care providers would receive a series of four rate increases, with the first increase on April 1, 2006. License-exempt home child care providers would receive a 35 percent increase by the end of the contract, from the current rate of $9.48 per day per child to $12.75 per day per child. Licensed home child care providers would receive increases ranging from $3.50–$5.76 per day per child by the end of the contract, with average increases ranging from about 20 percent in the Chicago metropolitan area to about 27 percent in downstate counties with urban centers and about 35 percent in downstate rural counties.

The tentative contract revises the child care rate structure. The revisions mirror key recommendations in the Illinois Department of Human Services’ 2005 Child Care Rates Report, developed in consultation with the State Child Care and Development Advisory Council.

As recommended in the Rates Report, the current age classifications of 0–2.5 years and 2.5 years and older would be replaced by age classifications of 0–2 years, 2–3 years, and 3 years and older. The contract’s quality incentives consist in implementing the tiered rate recommendations of the Rates Report. Starting in the second year, providers who meet specified quality standards would receive a premium of 5–20 percent in addition to their base rate.

The tentative contract also sets up a fund for state contributions to health insurance coverage for uninsured home child care providers. The state would contribute $27 million toward the cost of providing affordable, comprehensive health insurance to home child care providers in the third year of the contract. The home child care providers would be covered not through the State Employee Insurance program but through an insurance program that SEIU manages. Eligibility details and benefit levels remain to be worked out by SEIU.

Under the tentative contract, all home child care providers participating in the CCAP will be required to pay monthly dues or a fair share payment to SEIU Local 880 when the contract goes into effect in April 2006. Details about the dues structure under the tentative contract are not available. SEIU Local 880 members’ dues are generally 2–3 percent of their earnings and average about $20 a month.

Illinois’s child care reimbursement rates have not changed in six years. “This contract will help us improve the quality of care that we give to children,” said Martina Casey, a Chicago-based home child care worker who attends to seven children.

The tentative contract will become final if ratified by SEIU Local 880’s members, who will be voting until mid-January. Gov. Rod Blagojevich will have to secure funding for the contract, estimated to cost $250 million over its 39-month term.

The State’s tentative agreement with SEIU Local 880 affects only CCAP-participating home child care providers. SEIU Local 880 has no authority to bargain on behalf of centers. Earlier this year, Governor Blagojevich issued an executive order granting CCAP-participating home child care providers the right to elect an exclusive representative to bargain collectively with the State over the terms and conditions of their provision of child care services. The home child care providers subsequently elected SEIU Local 880 to represent them.

In a statement released after the SEIU Local 880 tentative contract was announced, Action for Children, the lead child care advocacy organization in Illinois, hailed the victory for family child care providers. Action for Children stressed the importance of attaining parity for center-based providers—to avoid limiting parents’ options and undermining the child care infrastructure that Illinois has so successfully built. Action for Children will continue its Equal Access to Quality Care campaign, which advocates rate increases for all child care providers.

For more information, contact Dan Lesser, Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law.

7th Annual Awards Dinner Most Successful in Shriver Center History

2006-07-13T16:23:50Z

Over 650 guests gathered in Chicago at the Seventh Annual Sargent Shriver Awards Dinner on December 1, 2005. The successful benefit for the Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law drew attorneys, public officials, corporate partners, and nonprofit and foundation leaders to support the Shriver Center’s antipoverty mission.

Jeffrey Sachs, who received the Sargent Shriver Award for Equal Justice for distinguished achievement in promoting the alleviation of poverty, addressed the similarities between a war on poverty in the United States and extreme poverty in the developing world. Professor Sachs, a leading economist most known for his work as director of the United Nations Millennium Project and as director of Columbia University’s Earth Institute, exposed what he believed to be the greatest myth about and similarity between the work of the Shriver Center and his work in Africa.

“The notion that we’ve tried [to end poverty] and failed—that lore that has been with us for 30 years is the biggest nonsense, and the biggest impediment to action. We haven’t begun to try in either the war against poverty at home or abroad for decades, but the times, they are changing,” Sachs said. Sachs’s global work found resonance with the U.S.-based work of the Shriver Center. He received a standing ovation from the packed ballroom.

The Shriver Center also honored the documentary filmmaker Morgan Spurlock for an episode in his FX series 30 days in which Spurlock and his fiancée, Alex Jamison, lived the life of minimum-wage workers. Spurlock received the Sargent Shriver Award for Equal Justice for distinguished achievement in raising awareness of the plight of minimum-wage workers in the United States.

“Visionaries like Jeffrey Sachs and communicators like Morgan Spurlock have embraced our efforts because they understand the true costs of neglecting the poorest among us,” says Barbara Carney, the Shriver Center’s director of development. Supporters believe that the Shriver Center is a leader in identifying cost-effective solutions to ending poverty that will benefit society as a whole.

“The Center has really held the beacon in some very difficult times,” said Sachs in his keynote address. “We have passed through a period of profound neglect for the poorest of the poor… and through this very difficult political period, the Shriver Center has been doing the most remarkable work and the most remarkable advocacy,” he added.

The distinguished awardees at the seventh annual awards ceremony made this year’s dinner the most successful fund-raiser in the organization’s history. Sponsored by AARP, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Illinois, and CVS/pharmacy among others, the annual dinner raised 35 percent more funds than last year’s event.

HUD Required to Renew Project-Based Section 8 Contracts After Foreclosure

2006-07-13T16:23:50Z

A new law requiring the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to renew project-based Section 8 contracts after foreclosure could change the landscape for properties facing potential foreclosure. Last month President Bush signed into law H.R. 3058, the “Transportation, Treasury, and Housing and Urban Development (HUD), the Judiciary, the District of Columbia, and the Independent Agencies Appropriations Act, 2006.”

Section 311 of H.R. 3058 may provide some assistance to housing advocates and tenants fighting to maintain project-based Section 8 contracts following foreclosure. Section 311 requires that in fiscal year 2006 the HUD secretary “shall maintain any rental assistance payments under Section 8 of the United States Housing Act of 1937 that are attached to dwelling units in the property” when disposing of multifamily property owned or held by HUD.

Previously Section 204 of the Department of Veterans Affairs and Housing and Urban Development and Independent Agencies Appropriations Act of 1997, commonly referred to as the “Flexible Authorities Provision,” allowed the HUD secretary to “manage and dispose of multifamily properties owned by the Secretary, … and multifamily mortgages held by the Secretary on such terms and conditions as the Secretary may determine, notwithstanding any other provision of law.” HUD interpreted this provision to mean that it had total discretion over the disposal of project-based Section 8 properties, notwithstanding any other law, including federal fair housing laws, and its decision was not subject to judicial review.

While the new law is an improvement on the Flexible Authority Provision, it still allows the HUD secretary to opt not to maintain the project-based Section 8 contract if it “is not feasible … based on a consideration of costs of maintaining such payments for that property or other factors.” However, if the secretary elects not to maintain project basing, the secretary must consult with the tenants of the property before deciding whether to contract with owners of other existing project-based Section 8 housing or provide other rental assistance, such as Housing Choice Vouchers.

Locally the troubled Lawndale Restoration project on Chicago’s West Side may benefit from the new law. The initial lawsuit filed last May by the Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law, the Housing Preservation Project in Minnesota, and Sachnoff & Weaver Ltd. was dismissed two months ago for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction. The court, agreeing with HUD’s interpretation of the Flexible Authority Provision, ruled that this provision gave HUD unbridled discretion to dispose of these projects irrespective of other laws, including the Fair Housing Act and the National Housing Act, and that HUD’s action precluded judicial review. The plaintiffs appealed the case to the Seventh Circuit. In light of the change in law, the case was remanded back to the district court.

For more information, contact Kate Walz at 312-263-3830 ext. 232.

Families Encouraged to Take Advantage of Expansion in Well-Child Care

2006-07-13T16:23:50Z

With the new changes taking place in the Medicaid program this January, families need help in accessing preventive health care. Without such help, simple health issues are exacerbated and become costly health emergencies. This need not be the case. By delivering key information about well-child care, the medical home concept, and how to access care, family service providers can help improve children’s health in Illinois.

Access to preventive health care will soon improve with increases in payment rates and other financial incentives for physicians as well as the new primary care case management system that will reinforce the medical home concept. Along with strong encouragement for health care providers to accept Medicaid, families on Medicaid should be encouraged to seek preventive care. By July 1, 2008, many service providers will have been trained to promote preventive health care for children, but they could be promoting it now.

Preventive health care and early and periodic screening, diagnostic, and treatment (EPSDT) services are fully covered by Medicaid and keep children healthy and avoid costly health crises. Besides having difficulty locating a doctor, many parents are not aware of the full services to which their children are entitled under Medicaid—a physical examination, health education, vaccinations, lead testing, and chronic disease management. Service providers can help educate the public by making parents aware of the services, what they are, and why they should take advantage of them.

A physician takes note, as a part of the well-child physical examination, of the progress of a child’s growth and development. Because children should reach certain benchmarks at specific intervals, parents should be urged to take their children in for the full schedule of well-child visits. A well-child visit is a time to discuss health history and to ask about growth, development, safety, or nutrition. If so informed, parents can be comfortable with the concept of well-child care and can decide better about their children’s health.

For example, some parents believe that vaccinations are not essential because many of the diseases they protect against, such as polio and measles, have all but disappeared. But this is far from true. Childhood vaccinations offer protection from serious diseases that cause fevers, coughing, brain injury, and even death. Declining immunization rates are responsible for several recent outbreaks of measles and polio. Parents must be made aware of the continuing need for immunizations and their safety and effectiveness.

Lead testing is another component of well-child care. Exposure to lead can happen in homes with lead paint or chemical substances such as gasoline and paint thinner. Lead poisoning causes serious problems—learning disabilities, behavioral problems, and developmental delays. Low-income children are especially vulnerable as they are eight times more likely to be exposed to lead. Children should have their blood screened for lead at 12 and 24 months. If they have elevated lead blood levels, sources of lead should be removed from their home. Medication is available to help lower lead levels.

For children with chronic illnesses, preventive health care consists in disease management. Many children have asthma or diabetes, and their health problems are compounded because they forgo proper care and suffer adverse health consequences. For example, low-income minority children living in urban areas have more emergency room visits, hospitalizations, and deaths from asthma, the leading cause of school absences. Preventive care is key because chronic illnesses are controllable with early and proper diagnoses, care, and medication.

Preventive services should be administered in a medical home. Even though care in a medical home is better, children on Medicaid overwhelmingly seek costly care in the emergency room. A medical home is a regular source of care in an office or a clinic, where doctors know and support the families with whom they work. Service providers should reinforce the medical home model when working with families. By visiting a medical home, families can avoid costly care and see improved health outcomes.

The Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law is working to increase use of preventive health care by increasing public education and awareness of children’s health issues. The Shriver Center reaches out to health clinics, service providers, organizations, and other interested parties.

For more information about efforts to increase access to and usage of Medicaid preventive health care services or to get involved, contact Melissa Buenger, Shriver Center, 312.368.1005.

Announcements

2006-07-13T16:23:50Z

Train-the-Trainer Workshops for Financial Educators

Financial education instructor training sessions using the highly successful All My Money and Your Money & Your Life curricula developed by the University of Illinois Extension and the Financial Links for Low-Income People (FLLIP) coalition will be held on January 19–20 and February 2–3, 2006, from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., at the Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law, 50 East Washington Street, Suite 500, Chicago.

The train-the-trainer sessions are a part of an ongoing project of the FLLIP coalition.

Registration fees are $140 for All My Money and $130 for Your Money & Your Life. The fees cover instruction, the instructor manual, materials, handouts, and lunch.

To register, contact Jami Schlafer at 312.368.8575 or by January 5 for All My Money and by January 19 for Your Money & Your Life.

FLLIP to Hold Winter Quarter Meeting on January 18

Financial Links for Low-Income People (FLLIP), the statewide coalition to expand financial education and asset-building opportunities for low-income people in Illinois, will hold its next quarterly meeting on January 18, 2006. The coalition of banks, credit unions, advocates, community organizations, government agencies, bank regulators, adult educators, and private industry is coordinated by the Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law.

FLLIP quarterly meetings keep members updated on the goings-on in the areas of financial education, asset building and protection, and access to the financial mainstream. All who are interested are welcome to attend.

The meeting and lunch, from 12:00 noon to 1:30 p.m. will be held at the Mid-America Club, Chicago, 200 East Randolph Drive, 80th Floor, Chicago. The instructors’ meeting starts at 11:00 a.m.

For more information and R.S.V.P., contact Jami Schlafer at 312.368.8575.