Poverty Law News

Poverty Law News is published weekly by the Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law.

Attorneys/Legal Services

Civil Justice Platform
The Drum Major Institute has published a pro-civil justice presidential platform to allow ordinary citizens to advocate for their rights and protect themselves against undue harm from unsafe products, unscrupulous business practices, and abuses of government power through the courts. The platform outline six key challenges to the civil justice system, including civil Gideon, binding mandatory arbitration, preemption, confidentiality agreements, medical malpractice, and insurance industry practices.

Education

Supporting Families, Nurturing Young Children
Head Start was reauthorized in December 2007, and the new legislation includes several important changes for Early Head Start. Most importantly, half of all new funds appropriated for the Head Start program will be used for early Head Start expansion. This Center for Law and Social Policy brief provides information on Early Head Start programs, staff, and participants.

Health

Screening for Eligibility Under the Pickle Amendment
Gordon Bonnyman of the Tennessee Justice Center has updated his quick and easy method of screening for Medicaid eligibility under the Pickle Amendment, which requires that an individual be deemed an SSI recipient under certain circumstances.

Medicare
This issue brief from the Kaiser Family Foundation provides an overview of Medicare's financing and the fiscal challenges the program faces in the coming decades. The brief describes how Medicare is financed and examines several methods of assessing its long-term financial outlook.

Housing

Foreclosure Resources for Consumers
The Federal Reserve Board has published a list of resources for homeowners threatened with foreclosure.

Juveniles

Policy Framework for Babies in Child Care
The Center for Law and Social Policy, in conjunction with the Zero to Three Policy Center, has developed a framework for state policies to promote the quality and continuity of early childhood experiences and positively impact the healthy growth and development of babies and toddlers in all child care settings. The framework sets forth four key principles that establish the foundation of supports that all babies and toddlers in child care need, as well as 15 recommendations that state child care subsidy, licensing and quality policies should address.

Social Security/SSI

Backlogged Disability Claims
The Government Accountability Office has released "Social Security Disability: Better Planning, Management, and Evaluation Could Help Address Backlogs."

Welfare

Hunger and Homelessness Survey
The U.S. Conference of Mayors has published its annual survey on hunger and homelessness. This year, the Conference surveyed 23 major cities on the demand for emergency food assistance, emergency shelter and transitional housing. Sixteen cities (80 percent) reported that requests for emergency food assistance increased during the last year. Among fifteen cities that provided data, the median increase was 10 percent.

Small Area Income and Poverty Estimates
The Census Bureau has released small area income and poverty estimates for 2005. These statistics include all people in poverty, children under age 18 in poverty, and median household income for all states and counties.

Poverty Law News
January 11, 2008