ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, August 1, 1996 TAG: 9608010072
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
SOURCE: Knight-Ridder/Tribune
NOTE: Lede
The federal government is about to cancel its 6-decade-old guarantee to support the nation's poor.
Ending weeks of speculation, President Clinton promised Wednesday to sign the sweeping welfare revision moving through Congress.
A few hours later, the House approved the bill by a 328-101 vote, with half of the Democrats voting against it. The Senate is expected to approve the measure today.
So, beginning next July 1, millions of poor people needing government help will find the rules have changed.
States will be responsible for designing their own welfare programs and deciding who is eligible for help. When the changes take effect, the clock starts ticking on welfare recipients who will have to work for benefits and face a limit on how long they can get help.
Deadbeat parents will lose professional and driver's licenses and be tracked down across state lines. And most legal immigrants who are not citizens will be barred from getting checks and food stamps, even if they work and pay taxes.
The president's endorsement left Republicans smiling and liberal advocacy groups outraged. Some Democrats denounced it as a cruel attack on poor children; others shrugged it off as a necessary political move in an election year.
But after 18 months of nudging the bill in his direction and two vetoes of an earlier versions, Clinton said it came down to a choice between a still-flawed bill or preserving a failed welfare system.
``A long time ago, I concluded that the current welfare system undermines the basic values of work, responsibility and family, trapping generation after generation in dependency and hurting the very people it was designed to help,'' he said at the White House. ``Today we have an historic opportunity to make welfare what it was meant to be - a second chance, not a way of life.''
One of the biggest flaws remaining in the bill, Clinton said, is the broad prohibitions of social services to people who are in the country legally, but who are not citizens.
The bill estimates the federal government will save $55 billion over the next six years. Most of that will come from denying cash, food stamps and some health services to legal noncitizens.
``This provision has nothing to do with welfare reform; it is simply a budget-saving measure, and it is not right,'' Clinton said. He said he will propose legislation to remove those provisions, but his aides said that probably would not happen this year.
Reaction was as passionate as the debate.
Republicans, who made welfare revision a part of their 1994 ``Contract With America'' campaign document, celebrated Clinton's decision as an example of how closely the Republicans reflect American principles.
They acknowledged, however, that the final bill - crafted to try to get Clinton's signature - is better than their first bill, which would have put children of teen mothers into orphanages and cut back money for school lunch programs.
Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R.-Roanoke and a member of the House-Senate Conference Committee that put together the final bill, said:. "I believe we've come up with an historic, common-sense reform of our failed welfare system. I'm pleased that President Clinton has joined House and Senate Republicans in supporting this legislation that will truly end welfare as we know it."
Among the changes included in the bill:
nMost heads of families on welfare must go to work within two years, or their checks will be stopped.
Adults will not be able to get checks for more than five years in their lifetime.
Families on welfare keep Medicaid, and, if the adults go to work, Medicaid continues for a year.
New legal immigrants cannot get most benefits in their first five years, and their sponsors' income will count in determining whether they qualify for help.
Immigrants who have not worked for 10 years or served in the military will not get food stamps or Supplemental Security Income.
Rules for determining whether children are developmentally disabled will be tightened.
Able-bodied adults with no dependents will have to work at least 20 hours a week to continue receiving food stamps after three months in a three-year period.
Religious and charitable groups and family advocates have attacked the plan for ending the federal safety net for the poor. Charities will not be able to pick up the slack as states become too overburdened to care for the needy, they fear.
``The politicians have done what they think the voters want,'' said David Beckmann, president of Bread for the World, a Christian anti-hunger group. ``But in several years, when the devastating effects of this bill become fully apparent, decent people will be horrified.''
Massachusetts Rep. Richard Neal said he wanted the president to hold out, but he understood the political boost Clinton could get if he would sign.
``Most of us have known that Sen. Dole would be scared to death that Clinton would sign a welfare bill,'' Neal said.
LENGTH: Long : 106 lines ILLUSTRATION: GRAPHIC: Chart by AP. color.by CNB