- Congress blasts Medicaid hole in states’ budgets, By Tami Luhby, June 28, 2010, CNNMoney.com: “Young children in Massachusetts will lose state-funded mental health services. Welfare recipients will see their employment and training programs slashed. And homeless families will lose nearly all their state assistance to move into more permanent housing. Massachusetts lawmakers had to make these and other difficult cuts last week after discovering they had to slash another nearly $700 million out of the state budget. The Bay State had assumed Congress would pass $24 billion in additional Medicaid funding for states before their fiscal years start on July 1. But that money hasn’t materialized. In fact, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., effectively killed the bill last week after deficit-wary Republicans blocked it for a third time. So officials in Massachusetts and 29 other states that counted on the funds to balance their budgets are left with the task of slashing services and payrolls once again…”
- No Medicaid money as new fiscal year draws near, By John Gramlich, June 28, 2010, Stateline.org: “A new fiscal year is set to begin, and at least 22 states are counting on federal Medicaid money that has yet to materialize. A congressional proposal to approve more Medicaid funding – which was originally part of the stimulus package and is set to expire at the end of 2010, halfway through the fiscal year that begins in most states on Thursday (July 1) – ran into Republican opposition in the Senate last week. The provision was part of a larger package that included an extension of unemployment insurance for jobless Americans. Republicans argue that the programs are worthwhile, but that the government must curtail spending…”
Day: June 28, 2010
Gulf Oil Spill and Low-Wage Workers
Don’t ignore low-income spill victims, advocates urge BP, By Deborah Barfield Berry, June 26, 2010, USA Today: “Vicky Townley is waiting to hear whether BP will compensate her for tip income she says she’s lost because of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. ‘Things are so slow we’re basically living from paycheck to paycheck, which is not very much,’ said Townley, a bartender in Gulf Shores, Ala., who filed her lost-wages claim three weeks ago. Before the spill, she said, she earned $60 a day in tips during the summer months, which helped in the long slog to rebound from Hurricane Katrina in 2005. ‘Things were just starting to pick up,’ she said. ‘Then the recession, then the oil. What next?’ Gulf Coast groups representing low-income workers say they want to make sure BP’s claims process doesn’t overlook workers like Townley in the rush to compensate fishermen and other high-priority spill victims…”
Cities and Tax-Increment Financing (TIF)
Study: Poverty decreases use of TIF, June 17, 2010, St. Louis Business Journal: “Rich cities are getting richer by using tax-increment financing (TIF) and poor cities are missing out, a new study shows. That could have a significant impact, considering more than half (56 percent) of all Missouri cities with a population of greater than 2,500 have adopted at least one tax increment financing (TIF) project, according to the study. For every 1 percent increase in the poverty rate, the likelihood of a TIF having been approved decreases by 9 percent, among Missouri cities surveyed. ‘This may suggest that the law be amended to target TIFs to locations that meet objective measures of economic disadvantage, such as poverty, income or unemployment,’ Kenneth Thomas, one of the study’s authors, said in a statement. He is associate professor of political science at University of Missouri-St. Louis. ‘As it stands, rich cities are getting richer by using TIFs,’ he added…”