Teen Moms Get Their Say--the Hard Way

The lobby of the new state building downtown, with its five-story atrium and oversize sculptures, seems--like a Gothic cathedral--calculated to make mere humans feel puny.

Somehow, though, I don’t think the five teen-agers who stood there Thursday felt particularly cowed as they prepared to take the elevator to Gov. Pete Wilson’s office. They stood tall, buoyed by excitement and indignation.

Students at Business Industry School, a mid-city continuation high school, they had come to deliver letters they and fellow students had written protesting the governor’s proposed welfare cuts. Last Tuesday, 16 students read their letters at a school “speak out”--an event they conceived after they had been denied an appointment downtown with a local Wilson representative.

Several weeks ago, they had asked to meet with senior policy adviser Rosalie Zalis. She had refused to see them in her office but agreed to go to their school. When she learned they also had invited the media, however, she bowed out.

So the girls had no appointment when they showed up Thursday in the governor’s suite. They had no idea that Wilson was somewhere behind the bulletproof glass and thick wood doors when they stepped out of the elevator onto the 16th floor.

Nor did they really understand, after learning that Wilson was in, why the governor’s press secretary wouldn’t even let them hand their letters to Wilson himself. Even teen-agers know a feeble excuse when they hear one: “There are 30 million people in this state. How can we let everyone see the governor?”

It’s hard to get any sort of credit for your convictions when you’re a single teen-age mother on welfare. Very hard to get the people in charge to take you seriously. Or even to tell you the truth.

It was a patronizing kind of afternoon. But at least Zalis agreed to see them.

After 10 minutes or so of discussion and confusion among security and press men ( Constituents in the anteroom! What do we do now? ), the girls were ushered into a small room to meet with Zalis. Kelly Martin, acting as spokeswoman, presented the letters and said she hoped the governor would understand that his proposed welfare cuts would be devastating to teen mothers trying to stay in school.

Zalis replied that she understood their lives were difficult, but perhaps they would allow her to tell them of the benefits in the governor’s plan: “Maybe I could explain to you how the program could help you,” she said patiently.

Yes, agreed the girls, they were very curious how a 25% cut in grants under Aid to Families With Dependent Children would benefit them.

A combination of gratuitous pep talk, browbeating and what could be charitably called misinformation followed.

Zalis is familiar with the students at Business Industry School, the only public school in the city with on-site child care. Last year, she visited the school’s parenting class. On Thursday, she would describe that experience as “giving up half a day of my time to meet you girls.”

In that hour, she apparently felt she had developed a special relationship with the girls. Last week’s speak-out, which attracted six TV stations, was, in her mind, a personal betrayal: “If you really had wanted to talk to me and wanted me to explain this program to you, you would not have invited the press,” said Zalis. “I am really sorry you were used like that.”

Martin didn’t buy it: “You could have come and talked to us anyway.”

Replied Zalis: “It doesn’t work that way. I thought I had a certain level of trust with you girls. I felt good about all of you. I felt we had developed a rapport. I try to teach my children and I hope you try to teach your children the best way to establish relationships is through honesty.”

The girls let it go. They pressed her on the AFDC cuts. How can they be expected to be full-time students and support themselves and their children if the governor cuts the monthly check for a mother and one child from $535 to $410?

Well, answered Zalis, if a teen mother on AFDC stays in school, she will receive an additional $50 monthly for child care.

The girls snorted. Fifty bucks a month will buy about half a week of child care, they said. Anyhow, they continued, that money could be taken away if they had more than two unexcused school absences.

Zalis was ready: “In addition to the $50 if you stay in school, you get an additional $90 if you go to a part-time job (for work-related expenses) and up to $175 per child per month will be provided to you for child care.”

The girls were taken aback. They’d never heard that before. An extra $175 per child per month for child care?

That’s right, said Zalis.

Not quite. The $90 for work-related expenses and the $175 for child care are not grants from the state to AFDC recipients at all. It is money they may earn that will not be counted against their welfare payments. The so-called “disregards” are mandated by federal law; the governor has nothing to do with them.

The girls pressed on: How can they take away that extra $50 if we have two unexcused absences in one month?

“They can’t,” said Zalis. “That is absolutely untrue.”

Au contraire. The provision to dock the money over absences is spelled out clearly in Wilson’s proposal.

And so went the conversation: You’re wrong, you’re off base, the governor wants to help you, you don’t understand, you sound like you don’t want to work, etc.

The girls may not have felt puny walking in; they sure did walking out.