Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, July 14, 1994 TAG: 9407220074
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C1 EDITION: STATE
SOURCE: LESLIE TAYLOR STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
It's another thing, he said, for those folks to travel the state and hear firsthand - from welfare recipients and representatives of community and social-service agencies - what Virginia needs to do to reform its welfare system and to ensure that it works.
Allen and members of his Commission on Citizen Empowerment swept into Roanoke on Wednesday as part of the group's eight-month mission to build on welfare reforms enacted by the General Assembly this year.
Since May, the commission has been gathering information to help them devise a plan that requires able-bodied welfare recipients to work for their benefits, provides day care for single parents and includes incentives for getting off - and staying off - welfare rolls.
"I don't mind helping folks who can't help themselves - someone who is disabled and can't work, or someone who is elderly," Allen said. "But for someone who is able-bodied and can work, they ought to be working. And if they can't get a job, they ought to be doing community service work."
The legislation that Allen has signed into law calls for thousands of poor families to receive job training, child care, transportation and health care in exchange for a two-year limit on welfare benefits. Participants would be required to seek private-sector jobs within a year of going on welfare rolls, or to take public service jobs.
They would be forced off the rolls completely after the second year, whether or not they had a permanent job.
Allen disputed claims that the commission's appointment - and charge - was just for show.
"People may say it's bad to listen ...,'' he said. "But my view is it's the most important thing we can do - learn directly from the people."
Allen and commission members heard Wednesday from Florine Thornhill, who was awarded President Clinton's Volunteer Action Award for her neighborhood group, the Northwest Neighborhood Environmental Organization. The group was formed in 1980 by residents who were concerned about the crime, overgrown vacant lots, abandoned houses and run-down parks in their community.
Allen scribbled his name into the concrete foundation of a once-vacant home, one of several that are being renovated by the neighborhood organization.
"We can learn a whole lot from Florine on financing," Allen said. "This lady could run a bank. She utilized different mechanisms that I'm not so certain other parts of the state are even familiar with.
"Everyone has an idea. Those sort of things need to be disseminated."
by CNB