Chairman Morgan,
Right now Kent County Friend of the Court is receiving a 66% reimbursement passed-thru by the federal government Title IV-D Welfare program. Block Grants offered to States for implementation of CSE programs.
The critical thing that is being missed is that this program is being used as revenue generation instead of aid to needy families. Title IV-D's Congressional intent was to recover the expenses associated with TANF (Title IV-A) welfare costs. What is happening now is that the State and the Counties are using the program to generate revenue instead of recovering the expenses associated with TANF by forcing the inclusion of middle-class, wealthy, and individuals that will never be on TANF rolls.
The result that has occurred is an overburdened Title IV-D (FOC) Welfare program where services are being offered to everyone without restriction, which has left the needy at the low-end of the totem poll because of the massive IV-D rolls. This has undoubtedly strained the County because it is now in the business of being a bill collector for the state to every open divorce and custody case. Is this where the County wants to be? Title IV-D funding will be cut again over the next several budget years which is going to leave the residents of Kent County in the position to have to foot the bill for the inclusion of the middle-class and wealthy into Title IV-D.
The County could very easily impose restrictions on this program to ensure that only services are provided to TANF/Title IV-A cases. This would cut the enforcement employees more than half and make the program manageable without the federal government and state ordering your County how to run its local welfare programs.
You have to ask yourself... is your County going to keep footing the bill for the inclusion of the middle-class into its welfare program just because it is being called something else? The questions have to be asked. why is the program overburdened in the first place.
I have copies of Kent County's Contract regarding Title IV-D welfare services and they also raise serious doubt upon the conduct of the judiciary and the roll they are playing in increasing the participation numbers of this program.
Lary Holland
5180 Cedar Lake Rd.
Oscoda, MI 48750
This statement couldn't be more TRUE. Even the United States General Accounting Office's Comptroller General recognized this in report DM95-24 (http://www.fms.treas.gov/debt/dm95-24.pdf).
On page 38 of this report, the first paragraph reads as follows:
"Despite the program’s shifting emphasis away from recovery of welfare costs, some state leadership—legislative and executive decisionmakers—still expect CSE to generate revenue, according to state CSE officials. In the eight states we visited, many program officials said that state leadership tended to focus more on the program’s revenue potential than on the social goals of promoting families’ economic security. "
What else needs to be said? I think the Comptroller General has said it best in this report...