[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 161 (Tuesday, November 27, 2001)]
[House]
[Pages H8402-H8403]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                  H.R. 3113, TANF REAUTHORIZATION ACT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from Hawaii (Mrs. Mink) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mrs. MINK of Hawaii. Mr. Speaker, I rise to advise this House that I 
have introduced a bill, H.R. 3113, which seeks to amend and reauthorize 
the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program (TANF). H.R. 3113 
currently has 49 sponsors. I hope that more Members will join in 
support of major changes to the TANF law that Congress enacted in 1996. 
The TANF block grants must be reauthorized next year. It is not too 
early to begin the review and discussion of necessary changes.
  TANF replaced the Aid to Families with Dependent Children program, 
which had distributed welfare benefits since the 1930s. Benefits under 
the AFDC program were provided as an entitlement and although benefit 
levels varied from state to state, the overall system was regulated by 
the federal government. TANF repealed the entitlement and made much of 
the eligibility and program structure subject to state law.
  TANF also imposed a cumulative lifetime time limit of 5 years on the 
receipt of benefits. TANF went into effect in 1996 and many of the 
families enrolled in the program are now reaching their 5-year limit. 
Five hundred families in Hawaii will be cut off in December of this 
year. In some states, thousands of families already have been cut off 
because the TANF law allows states to have even shorter time limits.
  The recession we now are suffering cost 415,000 jobs in October 2001 
alone. Thousands more jobs lost in November spread economic 
vulnerability through wider segments of our population. This 
vulnerability is especially severe for TANF families. In October, 
111,000 jobs were lost in the service sector, where many current and 
former TANF recipients have been employed. Layoffs are especially harsh 
for TANF families that do not qualify for unemployment insurance and 
who are no longer eligible for welfare. Of the 415,000 people who lost 
their jobs in October, only 40 percent were eligible for unemployment 
insurance. Of the thousands of workers who are not protected by the 
unemployment insurance system, many are mothers who have left TANF for 
the labor market.
  According to its proponents, TANF promotes labor market work as the 
way out of ``welfare dependency.'' Yet most of the jobs that are 
available to recipients pay such low wages that fulltime employment 
does not raise their families above the poverty line. So even for TANF 
recipients who do have jobs, employment has not yielded economic 
security. TANF actually impedes recipients' efforts to move into jobs 
at living wages. TANF does not allow recipients to meet the work 
requirement by pursuing post-secondary education; it limits vocational 
education to one year; and it caps the percentage of recipients who can 
be counted as engaged in a work activity by virtue of vocational 
training.
  TANF's work requirement stresses getting a job, any job, regardless 
of what it pays, what benefits it provides, and whether the combination 
of earnings and benefits are sufficient for a family to survive on. The 
failure of TANF to count post-secondary education as a work activity is 
its biggest hypocrisy and is one of the key problems H.R. 3113 seeks to 
correct. Research has long established that women with education beyond 
high school, especially a college education, are more likely to earn 
living wages.
  Child care is another nagging problem under TANF. Without dependable 
and appropriate child care there is little hope for a parent to be able 
to stay in an employment situation. Under the Family Support Act of 
1988, child care was an entitlement. TANF repealed the entitlement for 
individuals, making it even harder for poor mothers to assure care and 
supervision to their children while they are away from home meeting 
their work requirement. One of the powerful ideas in the 1996 welfare 
debate was the strong view that one of the ways to help children in 
welfare families is to find their fathers and make them provide child 
support. TANF requires women seeking welfare to disclose the identities 
of biological fathers and to help government locate them. It enforces 
these requirements with new sanctions reducing family benefits when 
mothers don't comply. These harsh provisions totally disregard a 
mothers' own best judgment about what's best--and safest--for herself 
and her children. What's more, TANF provides that all child support 
money collected by the government stays with the government as 
reimbursement for welfare.
  What Congress needs to do is to undo punitive regulation of mothers 
on welfare. Instead, we need to encourage states to make job training 
and educational opportunities available to recipients so that leaving 
welfare for the labor market means leaving poverty. We need to make it 
possible for mothers to seek job training and education, as well as to 
keep jobs that pay living wages. We need to treat women on welfare the 
same way that we treat all women--with the respect, dignity, and rights 
we all cherish for ourselves.
  TANF needs to take into account the many different reasons that 
people are forced to turn to welfare. Many poor mothers lack the skills 
needed to land better-paying jobs. They need access to training and 
education. Many cannot afford to be employed, because they lack child 
care or can't find affordable transportation or aren't assured crucial 
benefits such as health care. They need to be protected by all labor 
laws, be guaranteed child care, and receive Medicaid benefits for as 
long as they are income-eligible. Some mothers suffer from substance 
abuse or mental health problems or debilitating illness or domestic 
violence. These mothers need access to treatment, recovery, legal 
remedies, and skills-building services before entering the labor 
market. All children desperately need loving care in the home. Their 
mothers need the resources and the flexibility to decide when their 
children need a mother's care, not that of a sibling or baby sitter.
  I urge my colleagues to consider H.R. 3113, which seeks to: 1. Expand 
the definition of ``work activity'' to include education and job 
training at all levels as well as a parent's caregiving for a child 
under the age of six or over the age of six if ill or disabled or if 
after school care is not provided: 2. Stop the 5 year clock from 
running if the recipient is engaged in an allowable work activity, 
including education and job training; 3. Prohibit full family sanctions 
that punish whole families when the adult recipient doesn't meet a TANF 
rule; 4. Make paternity establishment and child support enforcement 
voluntary, while encouraging cooperation by directing all child support 
collections to the family; 5. Count treatment for domestic and sexual 
violence, mental health problems, and substance abuse as ``work 
activities''; 6. Prohibit states from establishing ``family caps'' that 
withhold benefits from a child born to a mother on welfare; 7. Replace 
the ``illegitimacy bonus'' with a poverty reduction bonus for states 
that lower poverty rates the most; 8. Restore the child care 
entitlement for TANF families when the parent enters the labor market 
or in a work activity leading to participation in the labor market; 9. 
Guarantee equal access to TANF regardless of marital or citizen status 
and enforcement antidiscrimination and labor laws, as well as due 
process guarantees; 10. Stop the clock for all TANF families during 
recession and temporarily restore TANF eligibility for families who 
have exceeded their time limit but who are otherwise eligible 
(recession equals 5.5% unemployment rate or higher); 11. Provide 
incentives to states to provide programs to reduce barriers to 
employment, to offer job training, and to encourage education; and 12. 
Stipulate that the statutory purpose and goal of TANF is to reduce 
child and family poverty.
  These changes will put TANF to work helping mothers parent in dignity 
and helping children grow up with economic security. I urge

[[Page H8403]]

my colleagues to join in support of H.R. 3113 by co-sponsoring this 
legislation.

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