Need for heat aid in Minnesota higher this year, By Maria Elena Baca, December 21, 2009, Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune: “This winter, Art Swanson is thankful to be part of a group he’d just as soon have avoided. The Anoka County resident represents the newest trend among the more than 125,000 Minnesotans who have applied for federal heating assistance since Oct. 1 (the start of the fiscal year): At 50, he’s a first-time customer. He was laid off in January from his job as a union glazier, installing windows and doors mostly in new commercial buildings, and work this year has been inconsistent at best. Statewide, the number of applicants to the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) is up 8 percent from this time last year, and 19.5 percent from December 2007. Administrators point to a growing number of families dealing with unemployment or underemployment for the first time…”
Texas agency slow to spend stimulus funds to weatherize homes, By James Drew, December 20, 2009, Dallas Morning News: “The state received millions of federal dollars from the economic-stimulus package to help poor Texans cut their energy bills, but by the end of last month, just seven homes had been weather-treated under the program. The state has spent $1.8 million of $163 million available over the past four months, with most of it going to administrative costs, such as the salaries of state workers. The weatherization program was a key element of the federal effort to revive the economy, billed as a quick way to create jobs, save energy and cut utility bills. In Texas, the task has been heaped onto a midsized agency that must figure how to hand out millions more in federal funds to local agencies and governments, but do it carefully enough to avoid wasting money…”
Hawaii’s welfare numbers rising for first time in decade, By Mary Vorsino, December 27, 2009, Honolulu Advertiser: “For the first time in a decade, the number of Hawai’i families receiving state- or federally funded cash benefits is up from the year before as the economic crisis hits the state’s poorest in what advocates say illustrates the scope of need in the community. Advocates also worry more increases are still to come. This year, the average welfare caseload in the Islands increased by about 4 percent compared with 2008 – or by about 300 families. ‘This is the safety net,’ said Debbie Shimizu, executive director of the National Association of Social Workers-Hawai’i, adding, ‘This group is probably going to get bigger…'”
Welfare program for jobless on rise, By Sara Gavin, December 28, 2009, Charleston Daily Mail: “After declining steadily for the past decade, temporary welfare payments from the state to families who have exhausted all other benefits are on the rise again. WV WORKS, administered by the Department of Health and Human Resources, was restructured in 1997 to provide temporary assistance to families who have exhausted other benefit avenues. The program initially carried a caseload of nearly 38,000. It is part of the larger cash assistance program known as Temporary Assistance to Needy Families. WV Works cases had been declining steadily over the past decade, bottoming out at about 9,000 statewide. But over the past 18 months officials have seen a steady uptick of about 1,800 additional cases, bringing the new total to almost 11,000 in West Virginia…”
States with expanded health coverage fight bill, By Kate Zernike, December 26, 2009, New York Times: “States that have already broadly expanded health care coverage are pushing back against the Senate overhaul bill, arguing that it unfairly penalizes them in favor of states that have done little or nothing to extend benefits to the uninsured. With tax revenues down and budgets breaking, the states – including Arizona, California, New Jersey, New York and Wisconsin – say they cannot afford to essentially subsidize other states’ expansion of health care. The bill passed by the Senate on Thursday would move toward universal health insurance coverage in large part by expanding Medicaid, a program whose costs have traditionally been shared by the states and the federal government…”
Health-policy experts say there is little basis for Sen. Nelson’s concerns about Medicaid expansion, By Alec MacGillis, December 19, 2009, Washington Post: “Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska, the final Democratic holdout on health-care legislation, said Thursday he is concerned not only about the use of federal dollars for abortion coverage, but also about the impact that expanding Medicaid would have on the finances of his home state. A Medicaid expansion would ‘create an underfunded federal mandate for the state of Nebraska,’ Nelson told a Nebraska radio station. He said states should be permitted to ‘opt out’ of the expansion and find other means of covering low-income residents. But Nelson’s concerns have little basis, according to health-care policy experts. In fact, over the next decade, such an expansion could benefit Nebraska more than it would many other states…”
