From the Los Angeles Times
20% in Los Angeles County receive public aid
The figure matches the total at the height of the 2001-03 recession, and officials expect it to rise significantly.
By Garrett Therolf
February 22, 2009
One in five Los Angeles County residents -- nearly 2.2 million people -- are receiving public assistance payments or benefits, a level county officials say will rise significantly over the coming months as the fallout from the recession continues.
The percentage of people on county aid already equals the figure at the height of the 2001-03 recession and far exceeds the one in seven who needed help during the economic downturn in the early 1990s and the one in nine assisted in the collapse of the early 1980s.
The rise in welfare recipients in the county is the first sustained uptick since welfare reform under the Clinton administration imposed strict time limits on benefits in 1996.
County officials warn that tens of thousands of additional frustrated job seekers -- unemployment in the county currently stands at 9.5% -- are expected to seek aid to weather the persistent recession once their other benefits run out.
The total includes those receiving food stamps and general relief as well as other county-administered aid programs, such as in-home healthcare. The cost -- shouldered by the county, state and federal governments -- was $334 million a month by the end of last year, according to the latest report by the county's Department of Public Social Services.
The rising demand has left public assistance offices ill-equipped to deal with the growing multitude of indigent people. In some locations, lines routinely snake hundreds of feet outside entrances.
"We have the highest human service burden of any county in the country in sheer numbers," Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky said.
"Two million people is the size of some countries; that's how big our problem is," he said.
To have reached the point of receiving county aid, recipients usually have little left.
Qualifying for help most often means they already have run out of unemployment insurance and drained their bank accounts and other assets.
In other cases, low-wage workers or those whose hours have been cut can earn so little that they qualify for Medicaid or food stamps.
The steepest increases in need have been in the Pomona Valley, the Lancaster area, the San Fernando Valley and East Los Angeles.
By June 2010, officials estimate, the number of people participating in the county's general relief program, now at 74,143, will reach 91,000. That would erase 11 years of reductions in the caseload. The program provides $221 monthly to individuals who qualify for no other programs. Roughly 60% of those served are believed to be homeless.
Also by June of next year, the number of people receiving payments through CalWorks, the welfare program for families, is expected to rise to 400,000 from the current 367,173. That would erase three years of reductions.
In a sign of how stressed the economy is, county officials report that just as many applicants are denied as are approved; these denials reflect strict qualifications in place for most programs.
For years, declines in the welfare rolls had been offsetting the costs of steady increases in numbers of people qualifying for healthcare assistance through Medicaid and other programs. The demand for those programs has been driven by a growing number of senior citizens and increasing numbers of people going without employer-based health and disability insurance.
That welfare and healthcare demands are increasing at the same time is worrisome to officials.
In an attempt to halt the increases, Miguel Santana, a county deputy chief executive, said he hopes in the coming months to place general relief recipients in jobs or in federally funded programs that provide cash and medical assistance.
"We need to act more aggressively than ever to stem the tide" in general relief, Santana said.
Many of those getting help say they have done everything they can think of to find work.
In the waiting room at the welfare office in Rancho Dominguez, where late last week even the line for a parking space was dozens of cars long, 32-year-old Erlinda Romero held a rolled copy of the Pennysaver, dogeared on pages listing jobs she pursued.
"I can't get a callback," she said, noting that training last year to become a medical clerk has not yet yielded a job. Meanwhile, she receives Medicaid benefits and $500 in monthly welfare for herself and four children.
Nearby, 50-year-old Ed Baldwin slumped in his chair waiting for his name to be called to renew his food stamps. He has been unemployed for three years, since being laid off from his job as a mechanic for heavy trucks.
"This is getting scary," he said. "There are no jobs."
County officials say they are worried that just as the need for county aid surges, the treasury is dwindling.
Property tax revenue, usually stable, is shrinking for the first time in 13 years.
This comes at a time when the county, the region's largest employer, has ordered a strict hiring freeze that will include the Department of Public Social Services. The department's director, Philip Browning, has been ordered to draft a budget for the next fiscal year that is at least 5% less than the current year's.
Although the federal government is acting to increase food stamp and unemployment insurance benefits, programs that are wholly funded by the county -- including general relief -- remain static.
The monthly benefit of $221 has not increased for more than a decade, and no one is proposing that it increase now.
"We've got to be able to do the basics. We are not going to be able to do it in the same way we have in the past," Yaroslavsky said.
"If the hiring freeze in effect shuts down an office," he said, "we are going to have to look at an exemption. But we do not print money in the basement of the county Hall of Administration."
……………
Why the illegals must go!
Topic: Illegal Immigration News in the US
Why the illegals must go!
April 19, 2007
by William Gheen
President, Americans for Legal Immigration PAC (ALIPAC)
www.alipac.us
Today, Americans face an unprecedented illegal immigration crisis facilitated by multi-billion dollar drug and human importing cartels as well as corporations which are inducing the invasion by aiding and abetting illegal aliens and using their influence on the Executive Branch and elections to paralyze existing immigration laws supported by over 80% of the American citizenry.
These events are not random and chaotic. Massive illegal immigration is the result of non-enforcement and under-enforcement of our existing immigration laws.
Supporters of illegal aliens love to claim that our immigration system is broken. The system is not broken. Elite financial and political business interests who could care less about the death and devastation they are causing Americans have sabotaged the system. Their profits continue to rise as they send the rest of America spiraling downward on a path to anarchy and Third World quality-of-life conditions.
By using their influence to suspend our existing laws, these globalist special interests have deprived all Americans of political representation as well as their votes, their voice, and a functioning Republic for which our flag stands.
When the laws of the American people – debated and voted on by their duly-elected Congressional Representatives and signed into law by the President – go intentionally under-enforced by the Executive Branch, all of the principles, sovereignty, and self-governance of Americans are derailed. The will of the American public, the existing laws, the US Constitution, and the borders of our great nation are perceived as market hindrances to the global elite. We the people of America are perceived as peasants and subjects beneath the power of their influence.
The American public has spoken through our lawmakers and in numerous polls. A super majority of Americans want our existing laws enforced, those responsible for illegal immigration fined and/or imprisoned, the borders secured, and illegal aliens deported from the United States for many years or permanently. These fact remain, despite several politicized polls which attempt to manufacture consent and make you believe such views represent a minority.
The truth is that most Americans want the illegal aliens to return to the nations of which they are citizens. The rallying cry is: "Illegals Go Home!"
We could easily list 101 reasons why Americans are upset about illegal immigration. Most are concerned about the 4,000+ preventable deaths of Americans by the criminal acts of illegal aliens on our soil each year. No corporate propaganda will change the fact that most Americans do not want to surrender or capitulate to the lawless masses rushing into our nation.
No poll or politicized source is needed to prove this point because the decision is based upon our nation's successful history and basic common sense. The answer is based on something that every judge, lawmaker, and even street thug knows. The penalties must outweigh the benefits if you want to deter any action.
It is common sense and common practice in America that for any law to be a deterrent, two important factors are in play. First, the laws must be enforced, and second, the penalties for any crime must exceed the benefits to those breaking the law.
It is truly amazing that we find ourselves as a nation having to explain these basic foundations of law to corporations and politicians in the year 2007 despite their existence since the dawn of civilization! Can you imagine what would happen in America if the penalty for robbing a bank was that you had to return half of the money you stole if, and only if, you were apprehended for the crime? What if the penalty for car theft was paying a $2,000 fine if you were caught with the stolen vehicle?
The answers are clear. Within a month, you would not have a bank open in America and you would not be able to keep a car worth more than $2,000 in your driveway for more than a week. How many millions of people would quickly take up the careers of bank robber and car thief once the rewards for the crime were higher than the penalty?
If American businesses and homes left their windows and doors unlocked each night and robbers were merely removed by police when detected – only to try again the next night – what do you think would happen? If big, global businesses practiced the same non-enforcement of security similar to the lack of border security and lack of immigration enforcement they have facilitated for Americans, they would be out of business in a matter of days or weeks. If they left their doors unlocked at night and just pushed people back to the street, America would quickly descend into such chaos and anarchy that we would be unable to sustain a population of 300 million. Our population would take a hit similar to the impact of the Black Plague on Europe, and we would quickly enter a new dark age.
Since illegal aliens can never afford to compensate Americans for what they have taken, they must go. We do not need to go door to door looking for illegals to deport in America. Attrition through enforcement works. Illegal aliens are leaving the states of Georgia and Pennsylvania in droves, not because they are enforcing the laws but because they have simply announced they plan to start!
Unfortunately, the current state of affairs in America has illegals flooding in by the millions each year and many law-abiding Americans fleeing the states of California and Texas and many towns and cities in search of more safety and security. Many Americans are on the run and finding few places left to run to.
The illegal aliens are sending a clear message on the streets of Los Angeles and other major urban centers. They are saying: "This is our land. White, black, and legal Hispanics get out!"
This is great news for the housing and real estate markets, Wal-Mart, and McDonalds. They are growing the economy using rapid population growth. This is great news for big corporations and bad news for Americans.
Attrition through enforcement will work. In fact, if President George Bush were to announce on national television that America would begin securing our borders and enforcing our existing laws in one month, so many illegal aliens would leave America that Mexico would have to set up refuge stations!
Another important reason that the illegal aliens must leave for the long term is that they'll return to their home communities with a message for their neighbors that their ill-gotten gains did not pay off in America. This is the only thing that will stop, or slow, the flow. Deporting illegal aliens and sending them packing is the only real way we can put a stop to this crisis.
The politicians in DC are very aware that Americans want the illegal aliens to go. That is why their latest Scamnesty legislation includes a “touchback” provision. Under these laws, the illegal aliens can hop across the Mexican or Canadian borders where special "Ellis Island" stations are set up for them to pay a fine, receive new documentation and be back in the US within days or hours.
The lunatics advocating this plan are counting on Americans to be so stupid and so gullible that they can say, "Look, the illegals left and walked back in legally. Problem solved!" They are eager to pretend to accommodate the American desires for the illegals to leave while quickly returning their slave labor force to our nation.
They know that Americans want illegals to leave and get behind a long line of legal immigrants waiting to enter the US, including millions of people who have been waiting 5-10 years. These politicians and the illegal aliens need to be shown the way to the back of the line. The back of the line is back in the country in which they are citizens, 5-10 years down the road behind all of the talented and law-abiding people who respect our laws.
If these traitorous corporations and politicians succeed in setting up these Ellis Island stations for “Operation Touchback," the revered symbol of Ellis Island will take on a new meaning that Americans see with contempt and resentment. Ellis Island will become a name associated with the horrendous betrayal of free Americans and the deathblow to the American Republic. This is a symbol of America’s surrender and the subjugation of all her people.
If we allow the politicians in DC to sign off on the many Guest Worker, Temporary Worker, Path to Citizenship, Amnesty, Scamnesty bills written by the US Chamber of Commerce, then no wall with an army on top of it will stop the next 20 million from crashing down on our country. We will have signaled that America is weak and will capitulate and accommodate. Already, the word is out in Central and South America that they can come and stay. Each time President Bush has opened his mouth about such programs, the US Border Patrol reports massive spikes in illegal crossings.
Since there is literally no end to the stream of illegals who want to be in America, this will be the end of America as we have known it and as history has praised it.
In the past, when America has cracked down on illegal immigration and the American people have signaled they want the immigration brakes applied, the policies have worked. New laws written near the turn of the 20th century greatly reduced the amount of immigration into America. When Presidents Franklin Roosevelt and Dwight Eisenhower launched large deportation campaigns in the 1950s and 1930s, illegal immigration slowed to minuscule levels as a result.
Whether you agree or disagree with the decisions of the past, these policies were part of the successful formula that have led America to become the most opulent and successful civilization in human history.
While some argue that these enforcement measures were racist and that some American citizens of different races were improperly deported at the time, we now have the technology and methodology in place to assure that American citizens and legal immigrants are not improperly affected by our immigration enforcement efforts.
The difference in 2007 is that the globalist corporations that have hijacked the American government want to stop the American citizenry from applying the brakes this time. They have taken away our ability to determine who can enter our nation and our ability to stop armed and unarmed invasions as granted by the US Constitution.
To take away the self-governance of Americans is to kill the very thing that has made us such a great and successful nation.
In a time of crisis like this, we must stand firm on the principles that have made America an attractive and great nation. We must stand firm on the rule of law. The law must be applied equally to big corporations and illegal aliens alike lest we all become slaves subject to the plans of masters instead of a free and empowered citizenry.
Illegal aliens and corporations must endure penalties for their illegal, deadly, and destructive actions that exceed the benefits they gain from their illegal activities.
The hour is late and it is time for Americans to stand up and say with one voice...
No Amnesty! No Guest Worker! Secure our borders and enforce the existing laws! Restore the American Republic!
No comments:
Post a Comment