June 95

Jurisdictions: Government Accounting Office; Dept. of Health and Human Services; Michigan;



By Rita Kidd

Current congressional and administrative activities to convert uncapped funding of welfare and social services programs to block grants for states has brought about an essential turning point for these programs. Severe dangers lie ahead if we are unable to overcome traditional preconceptions about how to administer and deliver public social services. On the other hand, limitless opportunity lies ahead if forward-thinking administrators and managers who understand the value of acting swiftly, giving up turf, integrating programs, changing basic business practices, sharing information, and using advanced technical solutions are willing to take informed, well-planned business risks.

A Government Accounting Office (GAO) report on welfare and social services programs released in 1993 noted that it is virtually impossible to develop an accurate picture of the cost of administering the full range of social services programs at the state and federal levels. In 16 states in which social services programs are state supervised and county administered, this picture becomes even bleaker.

While public and political attention has focused on the direct cost of programs and services for the disadvantaged populace, little attention has been paid to factors contributing to the rising cost of administering these programs. This is the area where the greatest danger or opportunity rests.

Under the current federal initiative to control costs and turn more control of programs over to states, one can assume that the inordinate cost of supporting massive information infrastructures built over the past two decades will not be funded separately, but will have to be met from block grants. These systems were built to support entrenched, labor-intensive stovepipe service delivery structures which drive public assistance, food stamps, child welfare, Medicaid and child support enforcement.

Yet federal agencies are complicit in having created this monster. In an era of government dogging the tracks of "dead beat dads," it is interesting to watch possible federal abandonment of its own, out-of-control brainchildren:

- FAMIS system transfers urged on states without regard for the on-going capacity demands or cost of day-to-day maintenance

- Child welfare system enhanced funding that has had states scrambling to develop anything for 75 percent of the money (often with systems that do not improve the way in which government performs)

- Mandated development of child support systems to beat an imposed deadline.



AUTHORIZED WAIVERS

In a desperate effort to reform welfare programs at the state level, the Department of Health and Human Services has authorized waivers to federal regulation for more than 20 states to test differing programmatic schemes, according to the January 16, 1995, U. S. News and World Report article on welfare reform titled: "Welfare, The Myth of Reform." The article states "Michigan Gov. John Engler, a champion of giving the states more responsibility for welfare, says that in his state "welfare reform means work." The article further cites a consultant's evaluation of Engler's 1992 reforms, finding that three years later the number of AFDC adults participating in work programs had increased by 1.7 percentage points, and had reduced the welfare rolls by one percentage point.

Although unintentionally, a February, 1995 article by Peter Drucker in The Atlantic Monthly, entitled "Really Reinventing Government" makes observations more than a little appropriate to the federal and state social services agencies' experiences. His article states, "These able people are getting nowhere fast because their basic approach is wrong. They are trying to patch and to spot-weld, here, there, and yonder - and that never accomplishes anything. There will be no results unless there is a radical change in the way the federal government and its agencies are managed and paid."

Public administrators feel powerless as they face the political realities of changing or reforming programs. On the other