Put heart into W-2 program

Published in the Wisconsin State Journal’s ‘Your Opinion’ Section

As reported by Brenda Ingersoll in the June 27 Wisconsin State Journal, the number of Wisconsin children living in families whose earnings are 50 percent below the poverty level nearly doubled between 2000 and 2004, from 44,000 up to 84,000

Ingersoll noted that such poverty “has an impact on all sorts of other conditions for children—instability in their housing, their schooling, their safety and their health.” It’s clear from this report that the Department of Workforce Development’s “Wisconsin Works” (W-2) Program failed.

What a stark contrast between these long term findings, and what Rep. John Gard, author of Wisconsin Works Program, boasted on the PBS NewsHour in 1996.“A lot of folks have moved in to work. We’ve seen tremendous success with people moving into private sector work.” In fact the Legislative Audit Bureau indicates that 43% of W-2 participants were employed by temporary staffing agencies.

Then Sen. Gwendolynne Moore, who appeared with Gard, had it right then and now when she said: “To say, as Rep. Gard has just said, to be cynical and say, we’re going to take away the safety net for children so as to force people into the low-wage work force…is a smoking gun.

The W-2 program has slowly transitioned into a “sanction-centered” program. Its principal activity is bureaucratic watchdog asking participants to jump through more and more eligibility and program hoops. The Audit Bureau noted that W-2 agencies imposed over $30.2 million in financial sanctions, often inconsistent, and that seven W-2 agencies sanctioned more than 20 percent of their participants.

And while W-2 is required to administer barrier screening assessments to identify obstacles to employment, only about 40 percent were actually done. Missed assessments result in fewer W-2 eligible program participants. And without assessments, needed services are denied to the detriment of both the participants and taxpayers. A growing number of W-2 participants are nearing their lifetime limit of program eligibility.

The real issue is how are we going to provide meaningful work assistance? Will we adopt a service-centered job assisted program which provides adequate child care, transportation, remedial education, job training, comprehensive health care, including paid sick leave, or are we going to continue to create bureaucratic barriers and sanctions?

With the number of Wisconsin families living in poverty steadily increasing we cannot be content with being ranked 13th in an otherwise top ranked state. Most importantly, how can we assist and protect young mothers who have legitimate barriers, but who continue to go undetected and underserved or who just can’t work?

As a professional social worker, I know that human service professionals working at Dane County Family Services, The Mental Health Center of Dane County, in domestic abuse programs, in our schools and child care centers, see underserved children daily.

W-2 requires that, after the participants use up their eligibility extensions, regardless of need and even if they have met every requirement, they will be abandoned. W-2 treats the economically disenfranchised differently than any other constituency. Those who are least able will get the least assistance.

It’s time for the citizens of Wisconsin to help our most needy and deserving families. Will this program continue its harsh policies, or will the Department of Workforce Development begin their own reform program to include compassion, love, kindness, hope and generosity?