By Mary A. Cooper

July 22, 2004: Congress will shortly begin a long summer recess (from July 26 through September 6), leaving most of the domestic hunger and poverty agenda unresolved. When the House and Senate return on September 7, they will probably deal quickly with outstanding budget and appropriations matters, postpone most significant issues until next year, and adjourn again as soon as possible in order to resume campaigning in this crucial election year. (Their targeted adjournment date for this session is October 1.)

Minimum Wage

The Senate may vote in the immediate future on a proposal by Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-MA) to increase the minimum wage. This action is most likely to come as part of the debate on the Class Action Reform Bill, beginning July 6. Kennedy's proposal would increase the minimum wage in increments to $7 an hour (by 70 cents two months after the bill's passage, 60 cents more a year later, and 55 cents a year after that). The minimum wage has been blocked by congressional inaction at $5.15 since 1997.

An increase in the minimum wage is desperately needed by America's working poor families. Opponents argue that most of the jobs affected are held by teenagers earning money for luxuries, but the truth is that over 70% of minimum wage workers are adults, most of them supporting families. There are about 17 million children in the U.S. who live near or below the poverty line even though they have a parent who works full-time and would be helped by an increased minimum wage.

President Bush has said he favors an increase in the minimum wage, but only if there is a provision in the legislation to allow states to opt out of coverage. Many states have enacted their own legislation establishing a minimum wage that is higher than the federal one.

Temporary Assistance To Needy Families

Congress has for the seventh time extended funding for Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) for a few months, this time through September 30. TANF is the federal cash assistance program for low-income families. Created in 1996 to replace the old Aid to Families with Dependent Children program, TANF requires adults in families on welfare to get jobs, ending their benefits after two years whether they are working or not. Studies have shown that about half of those who are forced out of TANF are not working a few months later.

The authorization for the TANF program expired in August 2002 and the House and Senate have been unable to agree on how to reauthorize it. Among the contentious issues are increasing the work requirement for recipients and using federal funds to promote marriage as a solution to poverty.

The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) has signed a letter along with many other organizations in the faith community calling on Congress to reauthorize TANF for five years and to: increase funding for child care; retain the current work requirements; extend benefits to immigrants; help families receive funds from enforcing child support orders, expand education and training opportunities; and allow states to waive or extend employment deadlines for people facing multiple barriers to employment.

Congress has expressed some reluctance to continue extending the current program without changes. House leaders have indicated that they are determined to increase the work requirement to 40 hours per week for all parents (including those with pre-school children) without increasing child care funding. The Senate has overwhelmingly passed a $6 billion increase in child care funding but has some members who are determined to divert funds from basic TANF benefits into grants for marriage promotion activities.

Considering how few work days Congress has left in the current session, there may be no substantive action on TANF this year. This would mean that, despite their reluctance to continue the current program without adding their ideological agenda to it, Congress may have no choice but to extend the current program unamended into the first half of next year. While this would have the advantage of giving Congress more time to have a real debate on the issues, it has a potential disadvantage. The Administration is requesting cuts in nearly all programs that benefit low-income people, citing the growing deficit and the high cost of defense and homeland security. Thus, there is the possibility that the TANF block grant to the states could be cut, if other budget pressures are very great.

Housing

The housing crisis facing low-income families has worsened significantly because of recent arbitrary actions by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). When Congress passed the HUD appropriation for 2004, it apparently limited HUD to funding housing vouchers at their August 2003 level, plus an inflation factor for local conditions. HUD and congressional Republicans now disagree over how this provision should be interpreted. The congressional appropriators say they meant to provide full funding for vouchers this year, but HUD has chosen to apply the lowest possible inflation factor, with the result that it is releasing significantly less funding to communities for housing assistance.

Local housing authorities, faced with reduced funding, are now telling landlords that they cannot pay the agreed-upon amounts in rent subsidies, which will inevitably lead to evictions as rents increase. Also, local bodies are withdrawing vouchers that are returned to the program by families who no longer need them. Normally, these vouchers would be reissued to other needy families, most of whom have been on waiting lists for years.

Legislation (RH.R. 4263/S.2467) has been introduced to clarify the intent of Congress and to reinstate the original method of funding vouchers. It is unclear whether this measure will be acted on this year.

President Bush has called for Congress to eliminate housing vouchers for 250,000 additional poor families in FY2005 and to block grant the program to the states and end provisions that now protect residents against discrimination and denial of benefits.

Child Nutrition

A major victory for low-income people came in late June, when the House and Senate each unanimously passed the Child Nutrition Reauthorization Act (S.2507/H.R. 3873), which the President later signed. The legislation reauthorizes many major nutrition programs through Fiscal Year 2009, including WIC (Women, Infants and Children), school breakfast and lunch programs, and child and adult care and summer food programs. Passage of this legislation means that more low-income children and, in some cases, adults will have meals and snacks before, during, and after school and in certain summer and child care programs. The bill provides for simplification of the application processes, for these programs, which will enable more families to participate.

Almost immediately after reauthorizing these vital feeding programs, Congress began to undermine its own good work by failing to provide adequate funding. The House Appropriations Committee approved $4.9 billion for WIC in FY2005, a much smaller increase than will be required to meet expanding need. They also cut funding for the Child and Adult Care Food Program. Advocates are urging the Senate Appropriations Committee to raise funding at least enough to meet current need.

General Assembly

Minimum Wage: The prevalence of poverty in the U.S. has captured the abiding concern of the General Assemblies. They have emphasized the obligation of the church to minister to people of all economic classes (PCUSA, 1956, p. 232), and to repudiate ". . . all assumptions and attitudes that confuse 'respectability' with righteousness . . ." (UPCUSA, 1965, p. 391). The Assemblies have also been concerned about this alleviation of poverty what the 1965 PCUS Assembly called ". . . a powerful accessory to our social ills . . ." (PCUS, 1965, p. 162). This concern has led Assemblies to propose a guaranteed minimum income (UPCUSA, 1968, p. 386; PCUS, 1971, p. 146), to urge special efforts to deal with unemployment, including guaranteeing employment (UPCUSA, 1968, p. 645; PCUS, 1976, p. 87; PCUS, 1977, p. 183), to support the designation of high unemployment areas as disaster areas, and to support programs targeted toward the needs of women, infants and children, and the hungry (UPCUSA, 1976, p. 503; PCUS, 1977, p. 184). The Assemblies have also favored welfare reform while opposing workfare proposals that seek to punish the poor (PCUS, 1977, p. 183; PC(USA), 1984, p. 504; PC(USA), 1987, p. 582). They have supported efforts of church and private groups to address the problems of the suddenly unemployed; and opposed proposals to balance governmental budgets and obtain prosperity at the expense of the nation's poor (UPCUSA, 1981, p. 306; PC(USA), 1985, p. 575). Most recently, the 1988 Assembly urged that the minimum wage be restored to an above poverty level (PC(USA), 1988, p. 363); and that not even in death are the issues of poverty and disenfranchisement laid to rest. (PC(USA), 1991, p. 1,030).