Fight to Protect Welfare Grows Desperate

Activists and lobbyists are waging a desperate, almost quixotic campaign to save the benefits of Los Angeles County welfare recipients, saying that thousands of people will face hunger and homelessness under proposed state budget cuts.

Since June, they have held nearly a dozen protests and mailed a flurry of letters to legislators. They have produced studies predicting social catastrophe if the cuts are implemented.

Still, the activists concede that their efforts will probably end in defeat, with the Legislature almost certainly voting for drastic cuts in Aid to Families With Dependent Children and other programs.

Part of the problem, the activists say, is that the poor are a nearly invisible constituency in Sacramento and the County Hall of Administration.

“(Welfare) is one of the most unpopular programs in the state,” said Rob Leonard, Southern California coordinator of the Campaign for a Fair Share, a statewide coalition of about 150 religious, labor and community groups. “It looks really grim.”

As part of a plan to cut $2.2 billion from state health and welfare programs, Gov. Pete Wilson is calling for a reduction in AFDC grants of up to 25%. Wilson has also voiced support for a measure that would relieve counties of the legal obligation to provide General Relief payments to indigent adults.

The Legislature and the governor are locked in a budget standoff that shows few signs of resolution. Wilson has said his proposed cuts are necessary to balance the state budget--an essential step toward California’s economic recovery.

Health and Welfare Secretary Russell S. Gould has argued that welfare programs create a cycle of dependency among the poor, discouraging them from entering the economic mainstream.

Faced with a political tide of similar sentiments, those advancing the interests of the poor maintain that the proposed rollbacks are a cynical attempt to make the indigent and powerless scapegoats for the fiscal crisis.

“It seems like the plan is to nail the poor,” said Nancy Mintie, director of the Inner City Law Center. “That’s nothing new in politics. But this time it’s particularly brutal.”

Los Angeles County officials say they have drawn up plans to lay off at least 300 workers in the Department of Public Social Services. Department Director Eddy Tanaka has said that his department is already severely understaffed and that further cuts in state funding will hamper the county’s ability to provide services.

The reduction of services would come at a time when welfare caseloads in Los Angeles County are at an all-time high. One in seven county residents--about 1.5 million people--are receiving some welfare benefits.

Hoping to drive home the point that most welfare recipients are “honest, hard-working people,” the welfare activists have persuaded dozens of impoverished mothers and homeless General Relief clients to step before the microphones and television cameras.

At a news conference last week, Emily Mongee--an AFDC recipient, college student and mother of two--held her infant son in her arms and wept as she said: “I’m not lazy. I’m not a bad person. I’m doing the best I can.”

In the most recent protest Thursday, more than 100 noisy people, mostly women and children, showed up to demonstrate outside the social services office on 117th Street and Central Avenue in South Los Angeles.

The protesters clanged empty pots and pans, chanted and held up signs. “We Will Not Survive the Cuts,” one sign read. “When You Chop, Chop From the Top.”

“There are very serious cuts being proposed and we want to get people’s attention,” said Geri Silva of the Equal Rights Congress, a community rights group. “We are beating empty pots and pans to symbolize the empty pots and pans we are going to have if these cuts go through.”

Inside the offices, more than 300 people sat or stood in lines processing applications for food stamps and other assistance. Outside, coalition members handed out voter registration forms. Silva said the poor will need more political power to fight the cuts.

“We are going to put Pete Wilson on the line, we don’t want any cuts,” Alberta Harris shouted to the crowd over a loudspeaker. “This is a serious matter and we can’t take any IOUs.”

“It is a scary thing,” added Harris, a mother of four and resident of the Jordan Downs housing project. “These cuts make me feel that eventually a lot more people will be homeless, living on the streets.”

Janel Island, a 38-year-old mother of four, said the poor are an easy target.

“No one wants to help, to do something that will really make a difference,” she said. “They are always saying, ‘Those lazy welfare mothers.’

“Well, I’m not lazy. I want to work,” said Island, who added that her efforts to land a job have been unsuccessful.

Island said she feared cuts in her assistance could make her family homeless. A cut in Island’s $900-a-month allotment would mean that she would have to move out of her $795-a-month apartment.

Angel Amador, 22, said she too might be forced to live on the streets. “How can I get diapers and food, pay for electricity and all the other things that I need?”

County employees have also joined the protests. Speaking out against the impending budget cuts and layoffs, county welfare workers staged a brief walkout Tuesday at the Southwest social services office in Athens. Religious and community leaders joined them in a march outside the office.

“The cuts will make things unbearable for social workers,” said Dan Savage of the Service Employees International Union Local 660, which organized the walkout. “Right now, they’re already working with double caseloads. They’re being pushed to the very limit of what they can do. You reach a point where you just can’t do anything more.”

While welfare recipients and county workers protest in Los Angeles, lobbyists are waging a lonelier battle in the halls of the state Capitol, trying to persuade legislators not to dismantle welfare programs.

Casey McKeever, a lobbyist with the Western Center on Law and Poverty, said his pleas often fall on deaf ears. The outlook is especially grim for General Relief programs, he says. Although advocates for the poor seem to have persuaded legislators to shelve a plan to eliminate General Relief entirely, the program will almost certainly be cut back drastically.

“There is still enormous pressure to further reduce the safety net for people who have nowhere else to go,” he said. “We’re just hopeful that that damage that is done can be minimized.”

As the recession in Los Angeles County has deepened, the number of people receiving General Relief payments has increased dramatically, setting records each month for the last two years. About 90,000 people receive monthly General Relief checks, which usually total $341.

Mintie of the Inner City Law Center said any cuts in the program would probably drive thousands of people to the streets.

“People are surviving by the barest of threads,” she said. “Any cutback is going to snap that thread.”