Michigan’s massive welfare reform, which removed 15,000 families from cash assistance in its first year, was never the law of the land. That may be about to change. Senate Bill 1386, which would codify the Department of Human Services’ controversial time limits on cash assistance, is rushing through the Legislature this week, in what appears […]
Michigan Department of Human Services
Posted inMichigan Politics Watch
Center for Michigan, Bridge win battle for transparency on welfare records
Bridge Magazine and the Center for Michigan prevailed in a Freedom of Information Act appeal, gaining access to records related to Michigan residents removed from cash assistance as a result of the state’s massive welfare reform. In May, Bridge requested data from the Michigan Department of Human Services documenting how many of the more than […]
Posted inChildren & Families
Welfare reform results: few jobs, few state answers, refuge in a vacant home
Welfare reform hasn’t been kind to Tamika Thomas. Eight months ago, the 33-year-old lived in a rental home in Detroit with her four children. She attended Wayne County Community College, where she was working her way toward an associate’s degree in radiological technology that would have led to the first good-paying job of her life. […]
Posted inMichigan Politics Watch
Analysis: State department doesn't live up to Gov. Snyder's transparency pledge
By The Center for Michigan “As Governor, I will ensure that government is open, fair, and accountable to the citizens by making Michigan a national leader in transparency and ethics.” That’s what Rick Snyder pledged on the campaign trail two years ago. Yet last month, the Michigan Department of Human Services gave two completely contradictory answers […]
Posted inChildren & Families
Michigan's prescription for foster kids: drugs
Taxpayers have spent more than $70 million in a single year in Michigan on psychotropic drugs for foster kids and other children on Medicaid. And, nearly a quarter of Michigan foster kids were on psychotropic drugs to counteract behavioral problems and diagnosed mental illness in 2008, according to a recent government report. That report comes […]
Posted inChildren & Families
Michigan Radio continues look at welfare reform's consequences
How are Michigan families faring after losing welfare cash assistance? Tracy Davenport lost her house and her car — and can’t find work because of a medical condition that causes her to fall down constantly. Learn her story at Michigan Radio, which has teamed up with Bridge Magazine to chronicle the first year after welfare […]
Posted inChildren & Families
Welfare reform: Back to the drawing board
What would you do if you could reform Michigan’s welfare system? That may be a question state leaders are asking today, after Michigan’s massive welfare reform was thrown out in court. Calling it an “end-run around the Legislature,” a Genesee County Circuit Court smacked down a Department of Human Services policy that knocked between 11,000 […]
Posted inChildren & Families
Welfare reforms put care-givers in a wrenching bind
Todd Stafford has an uncontrollable neurological disorder that causes him to beat himself in the head hundreds of times a day. The beatings have made him blind and caused his head to “look like Frankenstein,” he says. His wife, Tina Stafford, doesn’t have a job because someone needs to be at their St. Joseph County […]
Posted inChildren & Families
$400 prom dress, in shades of gray
The headlines practically write themselves. “Taxpayers on the hook for $400 prom dress.” “$2,000 cheerleading camp on the state tab.” Scrape away the easy sensationalism, and the story is more complex. The Michigan Department of Human Services paid almost $400 for a prom dress for a foster care teen — one of several eye-popping expenditures noted […]