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The article, West Virginia Lawmakers Propose Food Stamp Work Requirement, originally appeared at Heartland Fiscal Times on November 5th, 2015.

West Virginia Lawmakers Propose Food Stamp Work Requirement

Two West Virginia lawmakers have unveiled a proposal to reinstate the state’s work requirements for food stamp recipients.

State Dels. Danny Wagner (R-Barbour) and Patsy Trecost (D-Harrison) announced they will sponsor a bill limiting the amount of time able-bodied adults without dependents may draw food stamp benefits, returning the state’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program to compliance with the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act of 1996 (PRWOA).

In 2008, West Virginia received a waiver from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to remove work requirements for people receiving entitlement benefits in the state.

Back to Work

Robert Rector, a senior research fellow with The Heritage Foundation and one of PRWOA’s architects, says the bill would return the state’s entitlement programs to their normal operation.

“It looks like they are trying to put a work requirement onto able-bodied adults without dependent children in the food stamp program,” said Rector. “This policy has been recently implemented in Kansas and in Maine. Altogether, nationwide, there are about five million individuals … who get food stamps [in this way], to a total cost of around $11 billion a year for this group.”

Rector says helping ease people back into work benefits both taxpayers and those released from dependency on entitlements.

“It’s much more effective if, instead of saying, ‘We’re going to cut benefits off,’ you offer to these individuals a community service slot or job training or some sort of supervised job search,” Rector said. “When they did that in Maine, the caseload immediately dropped by 75 percent. In other words, the entire population that was subject to the work requirement simply dropped off the rolls.”

Helping the Needy

Rector says work requirements ensure aid goes to those who really need it.

“Any work requirement is, in fact, a very efficient gatekeeping device, and what you want in a good welfare program is to … aid anyone who really needs assistance,” Rector said.

West Virginia Values

James Shaffer, president of the Public Policy Foundation of West Virginia, says helping people help themselves is a West Virginian value.

“I think certainly in West Virginia there is an ethos that says, ‘You have to do something,’” Shaffer said.

Shaffer says the proposed welfare-to-work reforms would be a welcome change from the state’s past policies.

“You know, I worked in Gov. Underwood’s administration in the mid-1990s, when we saw a bunch of waivers with welfare reform.” Shaffer said. “We worked with [Gov.] Tommy Thompson and Gene Rogers in Wisconsin, and we were working in step with them, and we had very little work requirements back in those days. To get to this point is pretty reasonable, quite honestly.”

Andrea Dillon (thell1885@gmail.com) writes from Holly Springs, North Carolina.

The article, Kentucky City Goes Bust Due to Land Dispute Lawsuit, originally appeared at Heartland Fiscal Times on November 4th.

Kentucky City Goes Bust Due to Land Dispute Lawsuit

Lawmakers in Hillview, Kentucky are declaring the city bankrupt after losing a land dispute with a local company.

In 2002, government officials agreed to an eventual sale of 40 acres of city-owned land to the company Truck America Training LLC, but they later backed out of the land deal. The company sued the city, winning a $15 million legal judgement.

The city government receives about $3 million in annual revenue, prompting lawmakers to sue for a Chapter 9 bankruptcy declaration.

Not Like Detroit

Eric Scorsone, an economics professor at Michigan State University, says Hillview’s bankruptcy declaration is different from other recent municipal bankruptcies.

“I think it points to the fact municipal bankruptcies are each kind of unique in many ways,” Scorsone said. “This is quite different from what’s going on in Detroit or Puerto Rico. Maybe, in some ways, this is what we’ve seen in the past more typically, where a single event essentially causes it.”

Scorsone says creditors will argue the city should first try to put the burden on taxpayers.

“I know that the other side, the creditors’ side, can argue the city probably doesn’t need to be in bankruptcy,” Scorsone said. “Getting into the bankruptcy process, you can file, but then you have to go through an eligibility trial, and I think the arguments will be, ‘They don’t need to be here. They can raise taxes, [and] they can do other things to pay this off.’ And that will probably be the key part of it: whether the judge will agree with those arguments, whether the city has other options besides bankruptcy.”

Making Better Decisions

Jim Waters, president of the Bluegrass Institute, says even when lawmakers have made bad decisions in the past, good decisions going forward have proven to help reduce taxpayers’ pain.

“Outsourcing can work great,” Waters said. “Privatization is great [when] there is a strong contract. It seems to be that the government has maybe more options than the private company.

“This [was] just a bad agreement all the way around,” Waters said. “Any time that a local council or local politicians or a local governmental body allows themselves to get into this situation, voters really need to take a look at this in the next election. Taxpayers need to raise their voices there and demand that their representatives work harder to work this out.”

Andrea Dillon (thell1885@gmail.com) writes from Holly Springs, North Carolina.