Your calls and support are needed for the poor and unemployeed

WEDNESDAY, February 24, 2010
2:45 PM
Room: 200 State Office Building
Chair: Rep. Paul Thissen
HF3071 (Hayden) Exemptions from MFIP and general assistance asset limitations created.
HF2564 (Hayden) Minnesota family investment program time limit on assistance modified.
HF2576 (Hayden) Minnesota family investment program hardship extensions expanded.

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Talking points #1 on the welfare time limit bills

Put a moratorium on the
5-year lifetime limit for MFIP
HF2564 and HF2576 both suspend the five-year lifetime limit on welfare.

HF2564 suspends the time limit for two years - using state funds. Now is not the time to be cutting from the poorest of the poor. It is time for the well-to-do to pay their share in the form of increased taxes.

HF2576 is a fall-back bill. It adds a temporary hardship extension in counties where unemployment is 5% or more.

Why we need a moratorium on the welfare time limit:

* We are in an economic crisis.
* The unemployment rate is still very high in Minnesota.
* MFIP (Minnesota’s welfare program for families) is the final safety net for parents who either don’t qualify for, or who run out of, unemployment.
* Most parents have done whatever they could to get jobs and avoid using up their 60 months, but still, many still have only a few months left.
* MFIP parents are generally the “last hired” at a workplace, which means they are the “first fired,” or we have been working temp jobs.
* This means that many MFIP parents don’t have enough work quarters in the right time period to qualify for UI.
* When parents have no hope of any cash to survive on, the parents - often single mothers - are much more vulnerable to domestic violence and exploitation.

MN Coalition for a People’s Bailout and the Welfare Rights Committee
www.mn-peoples-bailout.org 612-822-802