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CLT UPDATE
Thursday, June 13, 2013
"Turning and turning in the widening gyre"
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State Auditor Bump's report is more proof that
the State House doesn't need to increase taxes. We need a Governor
who will appropriately manage our tax dollars.
The Boston Herald
Wednesday, May 29, 2013
Tax hikes not needed
By Holly Robichaud
Reform-hungry lawmakers still riding momentum
from this week’s blistering audit of the state welfare system are
expected to roll into a hearing next week with a slew of bills aimed
at the Department of Transitional Assistance, ensuring the fevered
debate is far from cooling.
“I’m expecting it will be lively,” Rep. Shaunna
O’Connell (R-Taunton), who’s pushing three bills with Rep. Russell
Holmes (D-Boston), said with a laugh.
The Boston Herald
Saturday, June 1, 2013
Lawmakers working on reforms for DTA
It took an army of the dead to do it, but it
seems the Massachusetts Legislature has awakened to the need for
some meaningful changes in the state’s welfare system.
The dead are the 1,164 welfare recipients who
a state audit found continued to receive public assistance long
after departing this world. Or, we should say, “began to
receive,” because in some cases the departed didn’t begin
“collecting” until after they had gone to meet their maker.
Payments continued for as long as two years or more after the
beneficiaries’ demise....
The audit found other fraud indicators: $27
million in EBT benefits collected out of state or out of country
in just six months, $15 million in suspicious EBT transactions
that went uninvestigated, the disappearance of 30,000 EBT cards
from one Department of Transitional Assistance office and much
more.
All of this comes on top of earlier reports
that the DTA failed to verify the eligibility of recipients who
collected $25 million in benefits and did not know the
whereabouts of another 19,000 recipients.
An Eagle-Tribune editorial
Sunday, June 2, 2013
Time to begin reforming welfare is now
State Auditor Suzanne Bump’s office, attacked
by the Patrick administration over a controversial audit
alleging welfare fraud, defended the report again yesterday,
firing off a letter declaring confidence in its work.
“Although you have questioned the accuracy of
our work, we believe that, after we meet ... you will agree that
the results are sound and fully support the audit finding,”
First Deputy Auditor Laura M. Marlin wrote yesterday to Health
and Human Services Secretary John Polanowicz, who last week
blasted some of the auditor’s findings as flat-out “false.” ...
“Your characterization that there is an
‘error rate’ with respect to those results is completely
erroneous,” Marlin wrote.
The Boston Herald
Tuesday, June 4, 2013
Auditors insist welfare report’s accuracy spot on
Bombarded by stories of welfare fraud and
abuse that range from dead people receiving benefits to $7,000
balances on EBT cards, lawmakers listened to reform proposals
Tuesday while questioning costs and suggesting the Department of
Transitional Assistance needs more time to implement its own
reforms.
Rep. Shaunna O’Connell, a Taunton Republican
who has pushed for welfare reforms, faced scrutiny from her
fellow committee members on the Joint Committee on Children,
Families and Persons with Disabilities about her proposals aimed
at preventing ineligible people from getting public assistance.
O’Connell, who grew up in public housing with
her parents, has been a vocal advocate for increasing identity
verification as a condition of receiving public benefits. She
said there are systemic problems in all of the state’s public
assistance programs that invite fraud and abuse.
“We don’t have just an EBT problem here, it
is really all of our public assistance programs” said O’Connell,
who spent nearly an hour explaining and defending her proposals
to the committee.
State House News Service
Tuesday, June 4, 2013
Lawmakers weigh welfare reforms ideas at public hearing
Republican state Rep. Shaunna O’Connell —
stonewalled for months by the Patrick administration over her
demand for a full accounting on welfare recipients with huge EBT
card balances — is now being told to fork over $800 if she wants
the public data.
“I have never heard of such a thing, as a
legislator,” O’Connell (R-Taunton) told the Herald last night,
vowing to pay the fee even as she slammed the Department of
Transitional Assistance for stalling her.
“I think they owe this information, not just
to me but to the taxpayers,” she said.
Shocked by a receipt showing one EBT user
carrying a $7,000 balance, O’Connell in January first requested
months worth of food stamp and cash benefit balances from the
DTA....
O’Connell said last night she is exploring
whether she can pay the fee with campaign funds or use her own
money.
The Boston Herald
Wednesday, June 5, 2013
Rep. Shaunna O’Connell must pay to see bloated EBT accounts
Budget negotiators crowded around a table in
House Ways and Means Chairman Brian Dempsey’s office on Thursday
morning to start talks between the House and Senate on competing
$34 billion budget proposals for fiscal year 2014 that starts in
just three weeks.
The committee negotiating the annual budget
is comprised of four Democrats and two Republicans, including
Dempsey, Rep. Stephen Kulik, Rep. Viriato deMacedo, Senate Ways
and Means Chairman Stephen Brewer, Sen. Jennifer Flanagan and
Sen. Michael Knapik....
The budgets approved by both branches are
dependent on new revenue from the transportation financing bill,
and Gov. Deval Patrick is waiting to see the final product
before issuing his verdict on the tax plan, which also has
ramifications for local road and bridge repair funding....
Rep. Keiko Orrall, a Lakeville Republican,
took the push for welfare reform to the airwaves Thursday
morning, appearing on FOX25 to exhort the conference committee
to eliminate the studies included in the House budget on the
prospects for photo identification on EBT cards and Social
Security number eligibility verification.
“These are simple types of reforms, real
reforms, that we can put in place,” Orrall said.
While both Senate President Therese Murray
and House Speaker Robert DeLeo have voiced support for photo ID
on benefit cards, Murray has urged patience to wait for the
Senate’s full reform legislation.
“Why? So we can drag the debate out? We don’t
need to. We can do this right now,” Orrall later told the News
Service. “I just want the system fixed because it’s a waste of
taxpayer dollars.” ...
A surplus appears more likely for the fiscal
year that ends June 30. Heading into the final month of fiscal
2013, tax collections are up 4.5 percent over fiscal 2012 and
outpacing the year-to-date benchmark by $539 million. The size
of any potential surplus will be affected by passage of any
supplemental budget bill to address spending that state
officials did not anticipate or did not budget for.
State House News Service
Thursday, June 6, 2013
Facing July 1 deadline, state budget talks start behind closed
doors
State lawmakers crafting a final fiscal 2014
budget and Gov. Deval Patrick head into the final month of
fiscal 2013 with tax collections up 4.5 percent over fiscal 2012
and outpacing the year-to-date benchmark by $539 million, which
appears to increase the likelihood of a year-end surplus....
With the new fiscal year set to begin in
three and a half weeks, a six-member House-Senate conference
committee plans its first formal negotiating session on Thursday
at the State House.
State House News Service
Thursday, June 6, 2013
Surplus looks more likely heading into last month of Fiscal 2013
Welfare reform crusader state Rep. Shaunna
O’Connell delivered on her promise yesterday to fork over $800
for long-awaited records on bloated EBT balances, saying the
pricey “ransom” was thanks to a surge of donations from fed-up
constituents.
O’Connell wrote the check and marched down
the hill from the State House to the Downtown Crossing offices
of the Department of Transitional Assistance to personally
deliver the fee.
“If DTA wants to hold these records hostage
and make me pay ransom for them, then I’m going to pay the
ransom for them,” she told the Herald as she embarked on her
mission. “These should be public records. The public has a right
to know.” ...
“We’re talking about taxpayers. They’re
paying their taxes, they’re paying for fraud in this program,
and now they’re helping to get these records,” O’Connell said.
“I’m just going to pay this. I don’t want to drag it out
anymore.”
The Boston Herald
Friday, June 7, 2013
Shaunna O’Connell pays info ‘ransom’
Big EBT balance list at stake
As Gov. Deval Patrick’s welfare “leakage”
continues draining billions from the state budget, the Democrats
find themselves reduced to ever more farfetched reasons for not
coming to the aid of U.S. citizens who actually, you’ll pardon
the expression, work.
Last week, it was in the alleged debate over
a Republican measure to require Social Security numbers from
public housing applicants.
As always, the liberals say it’s about
“refugees,” not illegals. And there’s some court decision from
1977 — about 20 million illegal aliens ago. But the
illegal-alien apologists always need new excuses, and this
week’s welfare Alibi Ike is Rep. Tom Conroy (D-Wayland).
The Boston Herald
Monday, June 10, 2013
Putting a ‘fat finger’ on welfare’s woes
Moonbat of the week defends Social Security double standard
By Howie Carr
Where’s the tax package?
Like me, I’m sure you’re happy not having to
fork over more money for Gov. Deval Patrick’s mismanagement …
YET.
In the Democrats’ zeal to hike taxes on gas,
cigarettes and utilities and create new taxes on software design
businesses, early this spring they bypassed public hearings on
the package. Hence, it is bewildering that the Legislature
managed to bulldoze through the tax bill in both the House and
Senate, but since then it has been stuck in conference
committee.
Behind closed doors, just six of the 200
members of the Legislature are negotiating whether to accept the
House bill that whacks us for $500 million or the Senate version
that takes $805 million out of our wallets.
The 40-plus days of lingering is not a sign
of hope that they have had a change of heart.
This is the People’s Republic of
Massachusetts, where you ignore facts such as a revenue surplus
of $549 million for this fiscal year.
The Boston Herald
Monday, June 10, 2013
We’re not out of the woods for a huge tax hike
By Holly Robichaud
We know how Gov. Deval Patrick feels about
Rep. Shaunna O’Connell (R-Taunton) and her crusade against fraud
in the state welfare system. Patrick has accused O’Connell of
making “a lot of things up,” so it is no surprise that his team
would throw up an expensive roadblock to her request for certain
EBT records.
But O’Connell has called the administration’s
bluff, writing a check for the $800 that the Department of
Transitional Assistance said it would cost to compile records on
high EBT account balances....
Secretary of State William Galvin’s office
urges state agencies to waive fees for access to public records.
When one of its critics came calling, the Patrick administration
chose to ignore that advice. That’s not democracy. That’s
payback.
A Boston Herald editorial
Monday, June 10, 2013
Petty on public records
The state’s top health official yesterday
backed off the Patrick administration’s criticism of a scathing
state audit of the scandal-wracked welfare department, saying
his team is poring over the report’s findings after a “good
meeting” with Auditor Suzanne Bump.
“I think we had questioned it initially,”
Health and Human Services Secretary John Polanowicz said of the
audit, which found taxpayer-funded benefits were being paid to
more than 1,100 dead people. “And now that we have the benefit
of the data and how they did their analysis ... we were happy
she was able to give us the data so we can look at our systems.”
Gov. Deval Patrick brushed off Bump’s May 28
audit, telling the Herald that “99.9 percent” of welfare
benefits are spent correctly, even as state officials challenged
the report’s findings. Bump’s office fired back a letter,
detailing the lapses found in the Department of Transitional
Assistance and offering to meet with Polanowicz.
The Boston Herald
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Official ‘happy’ to review welfare audit data
The state’s embattled Department of
Transitional Assistance has removed the interim tag from
Commissioner Stacey Monahan’s job title, formally naming her to
head an agency that has come under heavy fire over its ability
to root out fraud.
Monahan, who replaced Daniel Curley in
February in the wake of a damning Inspector General report,
officially takes over just weeks after state Auditor Suzanne
Bump released a report blasting the department for doling out
benefits to more than 1,100 dead people....
Monahan, the former chief of staff for the
Executive Office of Health and Human Services, once served as
executive director of the Massachusetts Democratic Party.
The Boston Herald
Tuesday, June 11, 2013
Monahan named new head of embattled DTA
The House Ways and Means committee will
consider a series of new EBT-focused reforms in its forthcoming
supplemental budget — just weeks after the release of a damning
audit aimed at the state’s embattled welfare system, the Herald
has learned....
The proposals, if cleared by the committee,
would be part of the supplemental budget filed on Monday. They
would mark the first action by House lawmakers since state
Auditor Suzanne Bump released her May 28 review that found the
state Department of Transitional Assistance had doled out
millions in benefits to more than 1,100 dead people....
If filed by the committee, they then have to
go before a vote by the full House.
The Boston Herald
Thursday, June 13, 2013
Proposed EBT reforms call for fingerprinting some recipients
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Chip Ford's CLT
Commentary
Who among us can keep up with what government and
politics is doing to us today at such a frenzied speed?
Every day lately it's a new scandal exposed
— whether out of Washington D.C. from
On High, or from Beacon Hill in parochial Boston. Government keeps
racing at us, we the taxpayers, we the people, assaulting us from
every direction like a swarm of wasps.
Lately, what Washington is doing to us scares me
the most — for it emboldens the lower
politicians at more local levels.
I got literally dragged into political activism
in 1985, when Massachusetts adopted it first mandatory seat belt
law. I still don't know why that issue broke this
camel's back, but I could then feel this coming if we allowed the
creep to insinuate itself into our collective subconscious, if we
accepted it. We the people defeated it on the 1986 ballot,
but the Nannie State came back every year, year after year, and I
kept fighting back. Until 1994, when we activists put a
newly-passed second mandatory seat belt law repeal back onto
the ballot again, but that time the people adopted it.
During that early period of my nascent activism I
learned to use a computer, began getting pretty good at it. In 1992
I authored "High
Tech and the Age of Intrusion." My premonition of frightening
things coming if we the people don't get control of our government
was, in hindsight, prescient. Today, between the IRS targeting
political enemies, the U.S. Justice Department spying on the media,
and the National Security Agency's data-mining of all our phone
calls and Internet usage, I was ahead of my time and learning curve.
I always felt this was coming, knew
I had to fight back every minute of the day with everything I had.
It became my vocation, my cause in life. In 1996 I merged my
organization (Freedom First) with Citizens for Limited Taxation and
the battle continued — and here we are,
as anticipated so long ago, fighting for Liberty's life and ours in
liberty.
Washington's over-arching power and the federal
bureaucracy is imploding, or at least I hope it is. It's too
early to tell, but more of we the people are aware of what's being
done to us. How this will all turn out is over the horizon still.
Our immediate focus as CLT, where we can be
most effective, is right here in Massachusetts. We Bay Staters
have similar problems as in Washington
— just on a smaller, more local scale.
We've now got an unexpected state budget
surplus of $539 million — totally
unanticipated — but the Bacon Hill pols
are intent on hiking taxes by over $500 million more anyway,
so the state can spend even more . . .
Elected public officials simply ignoring
politically inconvenient laws seems to be today's norm. They are
empowered to continue this trend because none are prosecuted under
the law nor ejected from public office by the voters.
What we're seeing in Washington has been
trickling down to Massachusetts, on a smaller scale but clearly.
If you follow these updates then you know how
hard State Rep.
Shaunna
O'Connell and a handful of others in the state Legislature have
been fighting to expose the state's unrestrained welfare giveaways,
to reform the system of government-imposed public charity at the
expense of taxpayers. Yet at every turn these elected public
servants are stymied, legally and not so much so, with simply
getting information from Gov. Patrick and his administration. This
latest indignity — charging a sitting
state representative $800 in order for her to attain information she
needs to do the job for which she was elected
— is just over the top and cannot stand. At least it
should not.
Even Secretary of State William Galvin
— a Democrat —
recommends state agencies to waive fees for access to public
records, but his recommendations have been consummately ignored.
Barbara, Chip Faulkner, and I each have made a
modest and personal contributions to Rep. O'Connell's campaign
committee, to help fund the ridiculous Freedom of Information Act
"charge" to her.
If a candidate for public office must spend down her
or his campaign funds just to do their jobs, then we who
provide all the money government extracts from us are doomed.
If these true reformers need spend too much of their
privately-raised campaign funds just to effectively do their
jobs, they won't have those funds to run a competitive campaign
to be re-elected. That solves Big-Government's problem, either
way.
This is not even isolated. Just yesterday I
received a second example of this oppressive trend. This is becoming
the standard for anyone
— even an elected representative who wants to dig into what government is doing to us, in our name!
Yesterday, State Rep.
Marc Lombardo
(R-Billerica) wrote:
"Earlier this week, you may have seen a
report in the Boston Herald
[see Holly Robichaud's full Boston Herald column below,
"We’re not out of the woods for a huge tax hike"
— Chip Ford]
that Representative Jim Lyons and I have discovered an abuse
of taxpayer money in the Department of Public Health. Over
$600,000 funded Project Party which according to the
examiner was a program that recruited “gay men...to attend
sex parties” that also had drugs, alcohol, crystal meth,
cocaine, marijuana, and embalming fluid to be smoked.
Reports also indicated sexual activity with minors.
"The administration has found a new way to raise revenue:
charge Republican legislators who question the
administration’s spending policies. As a result of
requesting more information that should be open for the
public, the Patrick Administration is forcing me to pay
$508.00 to get information that the public deserves to have.
Last week you may have seen that the administration charged
Representative Shaunna O’Connell $800.00 for information on
welfare fraud.
"The battle on Beacon Hill just got tougher. Not only do I
need your financial support for reelection, but now I need
your support to get information from a government that
refuses to open up its books."
Recall the irony; it was the Patrick
Administration that inadvertently opened this can-of-worms exposé,
when it sent out a taxpayer-funded mailing to the state's 478,000
welfare recipients at a cost to taxpayers of $276,000.
The Boston Globe reported on Aug. 10, 2012 ("Only
Mass. sent out voter registrations after lawsuit," by Stephanie
Ebbert & Michael Levenson):
"Massachusetts is the only state that has
agreed to send mass mailings to register welfare recipients
to vote, following a series of state lawsuits brought by the
liberal group Demos, which is chaired by the daughter of
Democratic Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren."
That mailing even included a pre-stamped return
envelope. The results, reported by the Boston Herald on Jan. 4,
2013, ("Welfare
recipients ‘missing’ - State scrambles as voter mail exposes holes
in system"), was initially that 19,000 of those living off taxpayers'
sweat were missing-in-action, the mail was undeliverable as
addressed.
And then came the truth, a month later, thanks to
the Boston Herald (Feb. 1, 2013, "Welfare
boss resigns in wake of $$ report"): The actual number was
47,087 households on welfare that are unaccounted for, fully ten
percent of the statewide mailing.
That was the beginning of the lies, and they just
keep being rolled out, so far with impunity. Now we're got that plus
1,164 dead EBT Card-holders who file for and receive
benefits, yet still the Democrat majority won't admit there's a
grave problem, never mind one that needs reform.
Pretty much everyone who votes cast their ballot
in what they perceive to be their self-interests: Either
immediate interests, or long-range for their posterity. Today
fewer seem able to distinguish which is more important. It's getting
to be a challenge: Which will out-number the other? Will
it be us givers, or will it be the expanding takers and their
short-term enablers? If the takers win, without us they and their
patrons will quickly lose too. We won't be here to fund their
leisurely lifestyles anymore, be they government/taxpayer dependents
or those elected by them. [See
Detroit]
It reminds me of something Barbara recently sent:
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
— William
Butler Yeats (1865-1939),
The
Second Coming
All We the Responsible can do in the meantime is
fight on even harder for as long as we can, and pray for victory in
the end. We owe nothing less to those who came before and provided
for us. We owe it to the next generation, whether they now
appreciate it or not.
I don't know about you, but I'll be damned if
I've sacrificed to fight a losing war all my life.
I expect you feel the same, or you wouldn't have
read this far!
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Chip Ford |
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The Boston Herald
Wednesday, May 29, 2013
Tax hikes not needed
By Holly Robichaud
State Auditor Bump's report is more proof that the State House
doesn't need to increase taxes. We need a Governor who will
appropriately manage our tax dollars.
Here is where your tax dollars are being wasted:
The latest report details roughly $100 million in fraud.
The Crime lab scandal is going to cost us a minimum of $332 million
In-state tuition breaks will cost $50 million
$275 million for illegal immigrants getting health care benefits
$30 million of mismanagement within the Department of Public Health
Right now, 6 members of the House and Senate are negotiating the tax
package. If you are mad about the fraud within welfare, then please
call the State House today to tell them not to raise our taxes. No
more money!
The number is 617-722-2000.
The Boston Herald
Saturday, June 1, 2013
Lawmakers working on reforms for DTA
By Matt Stout
Reform-hungry lawmakers still riding momentum from this week’s
blistering audit of the state welfare system are expected to roll
into a hearing next week with a slew of bills aimed at the
Department of Transitional Assistance, ensuring the fevered debate
is far from cooling.
“I’m expecting it will be lively,” Rep. Shaunna O’Connell
(R-Taunton), who’s pushing three bills with Rep. Russell Holmes
(D-Boston), said with a laugh.
Tuesday’s hearing before the Joint Committee on Children, Families
and Persons with Disabilities was set long before state Auditor
Suzanne Bump’s report set the State House ablaze, detailing millions
in public benefits going to the dead and out-of-state recipients.
But it’s expected to provide what O’Connell called a “timely” stage
for debate, including for GOP members who alone have nine bills
before the committee. They include calls requiring Social Security
numbers to apply for benefits, drug-testing welfare applicants and
cutting off recipients who fail to notify officials of address
changes.
“I think given everything that’s transpired, a lot of good will and
people’s ability to say, ‘Let’s give them a chance’ I think has
dissipated,” House Minority Leader Bradley Jones said of DTA
officials. “The status quo should be unacceptable to anybody.”
Committee co-chairman Sen. Michael Barrett (D-Lexington) is crafting
a set of welfare proposals with Senate President Therese Murray, who
this week said a promised bill will likely include House-backed
measures to put photos on EBT cards and target loopholes in the
state waiver program that allows additional benefits.
Some senators, including Jennifer Flanagan (D-Leominster), warned
against acting too early without a more comprehensive bill, noting
money would need to be put aside for some reform measures, including
the much-debated EBT photos.
The audit, released Tuesday, has riled all corners of Beacon Hill,
most notably the Patrick administration, which has gone on the
attack, calling some findings outright “false” and demanding that
Bump release all information on the 1,164 cases in which benefits
went to dead people or those using a deceased person’s Social
Security number.
A Bump spokesman said yesterday the office is working on a response.
The Eagle-Tribune
Sunday, June 2, 2013
An Eagle-Tribune editorial
Time to begin reforming welfare is now
It took an army of the dead to do it, but it seems the Massachusetts
Legislature has awakened to the need for some meaningful changes in
the state’s welfare system.
The dead are the 1,164 welfare recipients who a state audit found
continued to receive public assistance long after departing this
world. Or, we should say, “began to receive,” because in some cases
the departed didn’t begin “collecting” until after they had gone to
meet their maker. Payments continued for as long as two years or
more after the beneficiaries’ demise.
The total cost of the “questionable public assistance benefits” to
the deceased during the period examined by state Auditor Suzanne
Bump’s team: $2.4 million.
In the typical case, the audit found, electronic benefit transfer (EBT)
cards sent to the deceased were used by the living to purchase
things or draw cash.
The audit found other fraud indicators: $27 million in EBT benefits
collected out of state or out of country in just six months, $15
million in suspicious EBT transactions that went uninvestigated, the
disappearance of 30,000 EBT cards from one Department of
Transitional Assistance office and much more.
All of this comes on top of earlier reports that the DTA failed to
verify the eligibility of recipients who collected $25 million in
benefits and did not know the whereabouts of another 19,000
recipients.
Defenders of the welfare system, like Gov. Deval Patrick, claim to
be outraged about any welfare fraud but at the same time claim it is
insignificant and bristle at questions about what they are doing
about it.
The short answer is nothing.
If Patrick remains in denial about welfare fraud, the Democratic
leaders of the Legislature acknowledge there’s a big problem and
propose to do something about it.
That includes requiring a photo ID on EBT cards to prevent people
from collecting benefits they’re not entitled to.
Photo ID’s would make it harder for the heirs to cash in grandma’s
EBT card. It would also make it harder for recipients to sell their
EBT cards and for fraudsters to sign up for multiple cards.
“We’ve had a lot of discussions with law enforcement personnel who
have told us about the multiple identities,” Senate President
Therese Murray told the State House News Service. “When they arrest
some people, they have multiple identities on them including
multiple EBT cards and Social Security cards.”
House Speaker Robert DeLeo also backs photo ID. In fact, the House
budget called for photo IDs with the start of the new fiscal year on
July 1. The Senate killed that provision in its version of the
budget. Murray said what was needed was a comprehensive reform plan.
DeLeo would still prefer to make a photo ID requirement part of the
budget — and so would we — because it would guarantee quick action.
A comprehensive reform bill might take months, or years, to pass.
Murray wants a package of reforms that would also include reducing
the number of waivers exempting recipients from the welfare-to-work
requirements enacted as part of reform legislation passed in 1995.
Murray would also put a stop to a scam that involved transferring
custody of a child from a parent to a child to keep the welfare
flowing, according to the State House News Service. And she would
look into the habit some recipients are reported to have of moving
to warmer climes in winter while still collecting.
Yes, the welfare system needs a thorough overhaul but there’s no
reason to wait to implement the photo ID requirement, a simple and
practical way to deter fraud.
Massachusetts citizens, like Americans in general, are generous
people willing to come to the aid of those who need help. Just
witness the outpouring of support, financial and otherwise, after
the Boston Marathon bombing.
But their support evaporates when they suspect the system is being
gamed or abused, as the welfare system clearly is. Their patience is
growing short.
Those who want to preserve the welfare system for those who really
need assistance need to fix it and now.
The Boston Herald
Tuesday, June 4, 2013
Auditors insist welfare report’s accuracy spot on
By Matt Stout
State Auditor Suzanne Bump’s office, attacked by the Patrick
administration over a controversial audit alleging welfare fraud,
defended the report again yesterday, firing off a letter declaring
confidence in its work.
“Although you have questioned the accuracy of our work, we believe
that, after we meet ... you will agree that the results are sound
and fully support the audit finding,” First Deputy Auditor Laura M.
Marlin wrote yesterday to Health and Human Services Secretary John
Polanowicz, who last week blasted some of the auditor’s findings as
flat-out “false.”
The three-page letter offered to walk welfare officials through the
audit and provided a breakdown of how it found the state was sending
public assistance benefits to 1,164 dead people — or others using
dead people’s Social Security numbers — over a two-year period.
Marlin wrote that 79 percent of the cases pulled from Department of
Transitional Assistance files fit the Social Security numbers, names
and dates of birth of those in the Social Security Administration’s
“Death Match File,” while more than 120 others matched in some
combination of the first name, last name or D.O.B.
She also criticized Polanowicz’s assertion that problems his people
identified in a separate set of 178 cases reflected badly on the
data collected on the 1,164 dead. Patrick echoed the criticisms,
telling reporters at the State House that “nine out of 10 of the
examples we were offered are actually in fact not a problem.”
“We want to see all the data so we can understand the scope of her
conclusions and the scope of the problem,” Patrick said. “If there
is one.”
But Bump’s office has stood by the numbers.
“Your characterization that there is an ‘error rate’ with respect to
those results is completely erroneous,” Marlin wrote.
HHS spokesman Alec Loftus said administration officials are looking
forward to discussing the cases with the auditor and share in her
“spirit of cooperation.”
“(We) hope this final review will enhance DTA’s efforts to protect
taxpayer resources through the 100-day plan, and other initiatives,”
Loftus said.
A top Democratic lawmaker said yesterday that, any dispute over
numbers aside, the audit appears to have exposed real flaws in the
embattled DTA.
“The auditor and the governor can quibble all they want about the
numbers,” said Rep. David Linsky, chairman of the House Committee on
Post Audit and Oversight. “But the public should be rightfully
concerned about the accuracy and integrity of the work at the DTA.
“They shouldn’t rest on their laurels until no taxpayer money is
wasted,” the Natick Democrat added. “I don’t think they can do that
yet.”
State House News Service
Tuesday, June 4, 2013
Lawmakers weigh welfare reforms ideas at public hearing
By Colleen Quinn
Bombarded by stories of welfare fraud and abuse that range from dead
people receiving benefits to $7,000 balances on EBT cards, lawmakers
listened to reform proposals Tuesday while questioning costs and
suggesting the Department of Transitional Assistance needs more time
to implement its own reforms.
Rep. Shaunna O’Connell, a Taunton Republican who has pushed for
welfare reforms, faced scrutiny from her fellow committee members on
the Joint Committee on Children, Families and Persons with
Disabilities about her proposals aimed at preventing ineligible
people from getting public assistance.
O’Connell, who grew up in public housing with her parents, has been
a vocal advocate for increasing identity verification as a condition
of receiving public benefits. She said there are systemic problems
in all of the state’s public assistance programs that invite fraud
and abuse.
“We don’t have just an EBT problem here, it is really all of our
public assistance programs” said O’Connell, who spent nearly an hour
explaining and defending her proposals to the committee.
O’Connell filed legislation to phase in an online payment system for
rent and utilities (H 132), as well as prevent EBT card purchases in
states that do not border Massachusetts (H 133).
Some lawmakers on the committee argued DTA interim Commissioner
Stacey Monahan is in the midst of implementing reforms as part the
agency’s 100-day plan, and needs more time to see results.
Monahan, a former Democratic Party operative, was appointed five
months ago after former DTA Commissioner Daniel Curley was asked to
resign in the wake of an inspector general’s report that uncovered
welfare waste and abuse.
Last week, State Auditor Suzanne Bump released an audit report that
revealed more than 1,100 cases where dead people received welfare
benefits or people using a deceased persons Social Security number.
The Patrick administration has questioned the veracity of the audit,
demanding more data from the auditor.
During the hearing, co-chair Rep. Kay Khan (D-Newton) said she fears
O’Connell’s proposals are “all about directing DTA to do this, and
DTA to do that,” in a time when there are not enough resources or
staff within the agency to take on more responsibilities. The
interim commissioner is taking steps to curb fraud, Khan said.
“We all want to clean up the fraud and abuse, there is no question
about that,” Khan said.
Khan said she hopes lawmakers focus on proposals to help people get
off welfare and escape poverty, while giving DTA time to implement
the reforms it is already working on.
Rep. Daniel Gregoire (D-Marlborough) and Rep. Paul Heroux
(D-Attleboro) both expressed hesitation about the reform proposals,
saying they would be costly to implement.
O’Connell responded, “I would say it is not more costly than the
fraud in the program.”
O’Connell argued DTA needs to stop people who are not qualified from
getting benefits because it hurts people who truly need assistance.
Co-chair Sen. Michael Barrett said it appears there is a “meeting of
the minds” between liberals and conservatives on better using
technology to curb fraud. He said he appreciates the move to
increase data matching, but worries it oversimplifies the process
and understates the costs to implement the technology.
Barrett said he also wishes there was a way to verify reported
fraud, like the example of one EBT card user hoarding $7,000 on his
card, before those stories become “urban myth.”
“I don’t know if there is an EBT card with $7,000 or $7 on it,”
Barrett said.
O’Connell said she has a picture of the receipt showing the $7,000
balance on it.
Committee member Rep. Jonathan Hecht (D-Watertown) said he is
concerned the problem of out of state purchases is overstated and
penalties proposed in the legislation seem extreme.
O’Connell said her proposal allows recipients to use their EBT
benefits in bordering states, but people “who go to Florida for five
months” should not be able to use Massachusetts benefits.
Other lawmakers with reform proposals met resistance.
Sen. Kathleen O’Connor Ives (D-Newburyport) proposed legislation to
revive photos on EBT cards (S 61), an idea passed by House lawmakers
as part of the fiscal year 2014 state budget. Opponents said there
would be unintended consequences by requiring photo IDs like
discouraging people from applying for benefits.
O’Connor Ives said she does not want to enact draconian measures
that would hurt people who need help, but wants to find ways to stop
fraudulent use to restore public confidence in the system.
Committee member Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz (D-Boston) said she gets “hot
under the collar” about abuse because it affects people in her
district, and wants to cut down on it as much as other people. But
she thinks people are making assumptions about what constitutes
common sense reforms.
“Very few people in this building have actually experienced the day
to day logistics of living in this level of poverty,” Chang-Diaz
said.
Chang-Diaz said when she was a baby her mother was a food stamp
recipient. It was not uncommon for her mom to ask her sister or aunt
to go the store for her, using her benefits.
News of fraud has hurt families who genuinely need assistance, Diane
Sullivan, a Medford mother told lawmakers.
“This is my card of shame now. Sadly, when I am in the store and I
am using it, I look at who is looking at me,” she said, through
tears.
She questioned what the photos would accomplish. She said she often
sends her 9-year-old son and 12-year-old daughter to the store while
she works, and wanted to know if her children would receive a card
with their pictures on it.
Photo IDs will shame families and discourage those who need it from
applying for benefits, she said.
Barrett said he thinks the photo ID idea has “legs” and political
momentum within the Legislature, and asked opponents to detail
concerns and factual complexities involved with putting photos on
the cards.
“I think we have a real political, a real challenge there,” Barrett
said.
Sen. James Eldridge (D-Acton) testified against the photo ID bill,
pointing out the Romney administration abandoned the photo
requirement on EBT cards because of high costs and low impact on
fraud. DTA estimated the start-up costs range from $5 million to $7
million, and approximately $4 million every year after that,
according to Eldridge.
Eldridge also testified on a bill (S 37) he filed that would adjust
asset limits on welfare recipients, allowing them to accumulate up
to $10,000 in a savings account while receiving public assistance.
Eldridge said welfare recipients need to be able to save assets to
buy a car, pay off debt, or pay for education, without being kicked
off welfare rolls.
The Boston Herald
Wednesday, June 5, 2013
Rep. Shaunna O’Connell must pay to see bloated EBT accounts
By Matt Stout
Republican state Rep. Shaunna O’Connell — stonewalled for months by
the Patrick administration over her demand for a full accounting on
welfare recipients with huge EBT card balances — is now being told
to fork over $800 if she wants the public data.
“I have never heard of such a thing, as a legislator,” O’Connell
(R-Taunton) told the Herald last night, vowing to pay the fee even
as she slammed the Department of Transitional Assistance for
stalling her.
“I think they owe this information, not just to me but to the
taxpayers,” she said.
Shocked by a receipt showing one EBT user carrying a $7,000 balance,
O’Connell in January first requested months worth of food stamp and
cash benefit balances from the DTA.
But after state officials repeatedly ignored her, she twice scaled
back her request, including in an April letter asking for all
balances from August, September and November 2012, and January
through March of this year.
On the heels of a Herald report last week that the DTA still hadn’t
responded, officials sent O’Connell a letter yesterday, saying it
would process her request for $800. An estimate sent by the state’s
EBT vendor said it would take 10 hours, at $80 an hour, to find and
produce EBT cards showing large balances.
Evidence of bloated EBT balances raises new questions at the
scandal-ravaged welfare department, among them: whether such
recipients even need public assistance, and whether they are
fraudulently holding more than one card.
The DTA came under fire last week after a scathing audit showed
1,160 dead people were receiving welfare payments.
Gov. Deval Patrick has sought to downplay the latest welfare flap,
insisting to the Herald last week that the DTA program is 99.9
percent clean.
O’Connell said last night she is exploring whether she can pay the
fee with campaign funds or use her own money.
A DTA spokesman issued a statement to the Herald yesterday, boasting
about the agency’s 100-day initiatives to cut down on fraud without
addressing questions about O’Connell’s request.
The GOP lawmaker’s tug of war with the Patrick administration came
as legislators debated several welfare reform bills at a State House
hearing yesterday.
At one point, state Sen. Michael Barrett, co-chairman of the
committee considering the bills, cited the $7,000 EBT balance,
saying he wanted more ways to verify reported fraud before it
becomes “urban legend.”
“I don’t know if there is an EBT card with $7,000 or $7 on it,”
Barrett said.
Said O’Connell afterward: “I assured him it was not mythical.”
Material from the State House News Service was used in this
report.
State House News Service
Thursday, June 6, 2013
Facing July 1 deadline, state budget talks start behind closed doors
By Matt Murphy
Budget negotiators crowded around a table in House Ways and Means
Chairman Brian Dempsey’s office on Thursday morning to start talks
between the House and Senate on competing $34 billion budget
proposals for fiscal year 2014 that starts in just three weeks.
The committee negotiating the annual budget is comprised of four
Democrats and two Republicans, including Dempsey, Rep. Stephen Kulik,
Rep. Viriato deMacedo, Senate Ways and Means Chairman Stephen
Brewer, Sen. Jennifer Flanagan and Sen. Michael Knapik.
Though the budgets (H 3401 and S 1800) approved by both branches
have near identical bottom lines, the spending and policy plans are
full of differences minor and major, including levels of state
support for higher education, early education and welfare system
reforms adopted by the House but stripped by the Senate in
anticipation of the filing of a comprehensive reform bill due at the
end of the month.
The first action of the conference committee was to vote in favor of
a motion made by Kulik to keep deliberations between the lawmakers
private, as is typical for conference committees.
Before reporters were asked to leave, Senate Ways and Means Vice
Chairwoman Flanagan joked that she appreciated the UMass Lowell
paraphernalia in Dempsey’s office, prompting the Haverhill Democrat
to joke, “Don’t let that influence you on your decision with higher
education.”
The House included funding in its budget proposal to push state
support for the University of Massachusetts up to 50 percent of its
operating budget over two years, but the Senate did not include the
funding increase university officials have said is necessary to
avoid fee and tuition hikes in the fall.
Both Dempsey and Brewer are UMass graduates, with Dempsey graduating
from Lowell and Brewer from the Amherst campus.
Brewer and Dempsey are also the lead negotiators for their branches
on a $500 million new tax bill to finance transportation
infrastructure and the MBTA. Both bills have dominated the discourse
on Beacon Hill throughout the first five months of the year.
The budgets approved by both branches are dependent on new revenue
from the transportation financing bill, and Gov. Deval Patrick is
waiting to see the final product before issuing his verdict on the
tax plan, which also has ramifications for local road and bridge
repair funding.
“We’re making progress. We’re getting there,” Dempsey said of the
tax conference negotiations.
The other negotiators on the tax bill (S 1770 and H 3415) conference
committee are Sens. Thomas McGee (D-Lynn) and Robert Hedlund
(R-Weymouth) and Reps. William Straus (D-Mattapoisett) and Steven
Howitt (R-Seekonk).
Rep. Keiko Orrall, a Lakeville Republican, took the push for welfare
reform to the airwaves Thursday morning, appearing on FOX25 to
exhort the conference committee to eliminate the studies included in
the House budget on the prospects for photo identification on EBT
cards and Social Security number eligibility verification.
“These are simple types of reforms, real reforms, that we can put in
place,” Orrall said.
While both Senate President Therese Murray and House Speaker Robert
DeLeo have voiced support for photo ID on benefit cards, Murray has
urged patience to wait for the Senate’s full reform legislation.
“Why? So we can drag the debate out? We don’t need to. We can do
this right now,” Orrall later told the News Service. “I just want
the system fixed because it’s a waste of taxpayer dollars.”
The conference committees’ final recommendations are not subject to
amendment and the House and Senate will be asked to approve or
reject the budget and tax bills as recommended.
Since Gov. Deval Patrick sought a $1.9 billion tax package and much
larger investments in transportation and education, there’s a higher
than usual level of uncertainty and intrigue this year over how
he’ll treat the spending plan once it reaches him, with his power to
influence outcomes in the spending and tax debates limited if House
and Senate Democrats stick together in their support of the plans
drafted by their colleagues.
A surplus appears more likely for the fiscal year that ends June 30.
Heading into the final month of fiscal 2013, tax collections are up
4.5 percent over fiscal 2012 and outpacing the year-to-date
benchmark by $539 million. The size of any potential surplus will be
affected by passage of any supplemental budget bill to address
spending that state officials did not anticipate or did not budget
for.
Michael Norton contributed reporting
State House News Service
Thursday, June 6, 2013
Surplus looks more likely heading into last month of Fiscal 2013
By Michael Norton
State lawmakers crafting a final fiscal 2014 budget and Gov. Deval
Patrick head into the final month of fiscal 2013 with tax
collections up 4.5 percent over fiscal 2012 and outpacing the
year-to-date benchmark by $539 million, which appears to increase
the likelihood of a year-end surplus.
Department of Revenue officials reported Wednesday that May tax
receipts finished $29 million above benchmark even though
collections of $1.515 billion for the month were down $102 million
or 6.3 percent compared to May 2012, when tax collectors received
$200 million in one-time payments. The size of any potential surplus
will be affected by passage of any supplemental budget bill to
address spending that state officials did not anticipate or did not
budget for.
“Despite the decline in one-time revenues which we anticipated in
May, we remain above benchmark for the fiscal year largely because
of investor reaction to federal fiscal policies implemented in
January,” Revenue Commissioner Amy Pitter said in a statement. “This
kind of behavior does not reflect normal economic activity that
impacts future revenues.”
With the new fiscal year set to begin in three and a half weeks, a
six-member House-Senate conference committee plans its first formal
negotiating session on Thursday at the State House.
The Boston Herald
Friday, June 7, 2013
Shaunna O’Connell pays info ‘ransom’
Big EBT balance list at stake
By Matt Stout
Welfare reform crusader state Rep. Shaunna O’Connell delivered on
her promise yesterday to fork over $800 for long-awaited records on
bloated EBT balances, saying the pricey “ransom” was thanks to a
surge of donations from fed-up constituents.
O’Connell wrote the check and marched down the hill from the State
House to the Downtown Crossing offices of the Department of
Transitional Assistance to personally deliver the fee.
“If DTA wants to hold these records hostage and make me pay ransom
for them, then I’m going to pay the ransom for them,” she told the
Herald as she embarked on her mission. “These should be public
records. The public has a right to know.”
O’Connell is demanding electronic copies of all EBT balances over a
six-month period this past fall and winter with balances above
$1,500. She was told the records will be delivered within 10 days.
Gov. Deval Patrick has supported the $800 price tag for the records,
with officials saying the money will be used to compile the data.
“We’re talking about taxpayers. They’re paying their taxes, they’re
paying for fraud in this program, and now they’re helping to get
these records,” O’Connell said. “I’m just going to pay this. I don’t
want to drag it out anymore.”
O’Connell can use campaign funds for political expenditures as long
as it [is] “not primarily personal” in nature, according to a
spokesman for the Office of Campaign and Political Finance.
“Campaign funds can be used to pay for a records request if it
enhances their political future,” said spokesman Jason Tait, adding
he couldn’t directly comment on O’Connell’s case.
O’Connell said she launched her EBT project after a store owner in
Pittsfield sent her a receipt showing a customer’s alarming $7,000
EBT balance.
“Somebody who accumulated that much money shouldn’t be on welfare,”
she said. “That’s fraud.”
DTA spokesman Alec Loftus said in a statement yesterday: “We are
glad that Representative O’Connell is paying for her request, so
taxpayers don’t have to pick up the tab.”
The Taunton Republican’s do-it-yourself probe comes a week after
state Auditor Suzanne M. Bump released a scathing report showing DTA
paid about $2.4 million to 1,100 dead people — and doled out
millions more to live recipients collecting EBT benefits from
Florida and Las Vegas to the Virgin Islands.
Evidence of sky-high EBT balances could raise new questions at the
scandal-ravaged welfare department, including whether such
recipients even need public assistance and whether they are
fraudulently holding more than one card.
The payoff came as a committee of lawmakers dove into closed-door
meetings to hash out a
$34 billion state budget, with House-passed
welfare reforms looming large in the negotiations.
The Boston Herald
Monday, June 10, 2013
Putting a ‘fat finger’ on welfare’s woes
Moonbat of the week defends Social Security double standard
By Howie Carr
As Gov. Deval Patrick’s welfare “leakage” continues draining
billions from the state budget, the Democrats find themselves
reduced to ever more farfetched reasons for not coming to the aid of
U.S. citizens who actually, you’ll pardon the expression, work.
Last week, it was in the alleged debate over a Republican measure to
require Social Security numbers from public housing applicants.
As always, the liberals say it’s about “refugees,” not illegals. And
there’s some court decision from 1977 — about 20 million illegal
aliens ago. But the illegal-alien apologists always need new
excuses, and this week’s welfare Alibi Ike is Rep. Tom Conroy
(D-Wayland).
Conroy tried to run for the U.S. Senate last year, but couldn’t
withstand fake Indian Elizabeth Warren’s juggernaut. This moonbat’s
moonbat won’t be out-moonbatted again, and last week, he took to the
floor of the House to oppose the GOP amendment.
The State House News Service reports Conroy first borrowed the
governor’s latest lame rationalization — that the welfare system is
99 percent accurate “but it’s not perfect.”
Just ask Auntie Zeituni, right?
Conroy then discussed how to correct that pesky 1 percent error
rate:
“You need to scrub the data and find out if it was fat fingers
yielding bad data.”
The fat fingers defense! How can anyone applying for welfare be
expected to have a Social Security number when the hack data
processors have fat fingers and hit the wrong keys?
Fat fingers — why didn’t anyone think of that before?
“It takes a lot of resources, technology and outside consultants to
write the algorithms to see if we can yield better matches,” Conroy
continued, “It can take weeks or months.”
Rep. Conroy, are “fat fingers” the reason why all the dead people
are getting EBT cards?
Someone call Auditor Bump, we may have unearthed a new clue in your
fraud probe.
Can the “fat fingers” excuse be used in the Dreaded Private Sector?
Will the IRS buy this — if you’re a Republican?
Rep. Randy Hunt (R-Sandwich), a CPA, was puzzled: “We do this at our
business all the time by logging into the Social Security
Administration. Are we not making this more complicated than it is?”
“Again, easy to do on a singular basis,” Conroy replied.
See, if you’re inputting only one Social Security number at a time,
you can use a pencil or a pen to hit the right numbers on the
keyboard. That way you don’t have to worry about your fat fingers.
And if you think it’s tough dieting to get rid of those last 10
pounds, have you ever tried to drop a few ounces on your fingers?
Conroy added, “The folks receiving these benefits are sometimes
challenged by no fault of their own to comply with all the requests
we are making of them.”
Requests? Nobody asked them to get a job, or pay taxes. We don’t
even ask them to learn English.
Look on the bright side. At least there aren’t any dead people
“living” in public housing. Or are there?
Rep. Shaunna O’Connell (R-Taunton) spoke next: “I think it’s
unacceptable to tell taxpayers we don’t have the ability to do these
checks while we’re handing out benefits. This is a safety issue as
well because you cannot do a CORI or sex-offender check if you don’t
have a Social Security number. Florida is doing it, New Hampshire is
doing it, Illinois is doing it. It can be done.”
Not here in Massachusetts. Our data processors have fat fingers.
The Republican amendment failed, by the way, 96-51. Because our
legislators have fat heads.
The Boston Herald
Monday, June 10, 2013
We’re not out of the woods for a huge tax hike
By Holly Robichaud
Where’s the tax package?
Like me, I’m sure you’re happy not having to fork over more money
for Gov. Deval Patrick’s mismanagement … YET.
In the Democrats’ zeal to hike taxes on gas, cigarettes and
utilities and create new taxes on software design businesses, early
this spring they bypassed public hearings on the package. Hence, it
is bewildering that the Legislature managed to bulldoze through the
tax bill in both the House and Senate, but since then it has been
stuck in conference committee.
Behind closed doors, just six of the 200 members of the Legislature
are negotiating whether to accept the House bill that whacks us for
$500 million or the Senate version that takes $805 million out of
our wallets.
The 40-plus days of lingering is not a sign of hope that they have
had a change of heart.
This is the People’s Republic of Massachusetts, where you ignore
facts such as a revenue surplus of $549 million for this fiscal
year.
Bacon Hill is the place where taxes are raised before EBT reforms
are enacted to save money.
It’s not as if taxes have not already been increased this year. Our
napping governor forced Amazon.com to start collecting sales taxes.
Deval has even taken to filling the state’s coffers by holding
public information hostage, and shaking legislators down for ransom.
Representatives Jim Lyons (R-Andover) and Marc Lombardo
(R-Billerica) are two of the victims being extorted $508.44 for
their records request.
“Revenue is being increased by charging Republican legislators who
question his administration’s spending policies,” said Lombardo.
These Republicans are trying to find out why the Department of
Health spent $600,000 on the program called Project Party that
studies sex parties. Wonder why the reluctance? I’m sure the
taxpayers won’t “bitch and moan” about it, to quote Patrick’s own
characterization of public questioning of official actions.
“The governor, who refuses to share information (about) how tax
money is being spent, is forcing legislators to pay for data that
should be available. So much for openness and transparency,” said
Lyons.
Democrats already have been recorded on roll call votes in favor of
the tax package once, so a second vote won’t be all that bothersome
to them. Moreover, these tax-and-spend liberals already have spent
the hike in the new budget. So the chances that they will not pass
the increases are slim and none.
The most likely reason that we have been temporarily spared is due
to an upcoming U.S. Senate special election. Dirty Ed Markey’s
allies in the Legislature will wait until after June 25 in order to
avoid angering taxpayers who would take out their frustration at the
polls.
Holly Robichaud is a Republican strategist.
The Boston Herald
Monday, June 10, 2013
A Boston Herald editorial
Petty on public records
We know how Gov. Deval Patrick feels about Rep. Shaunna O’Connell
(R-Taunton) and her crusade against fraud in the state welfare
system. Patrick has accused O’Connell of making “a lot of things
up,” so it is no surprise that his team would throw up an expensive
roadblock to her request for certain EBT records.
But O’Connell has called the administration’s bluff, writing a check
for the $800 that the Department of Transitional Assistance said it
would cost to compile records on high EBT account balances.
Now, it’s true that O’Connell is on a bit of a fishing expedition.
But what if she were simply a curious, concerned citizen — without
access to campaign funds to cover the bill and the attention of
reporters to expose the outrage. Is it this administration’s
practice to stonewall all such records requests — or to quote the
taxpayers such outlandish fees for access?
In Massachusetts, a custodian of public records can charge no
greater than the prorated hourly wage of the lowest-paid employee
who is capable of performing the task. An estimate sent to O’Connell
by the state’s EBT vendor said it would take 10 hours, at $80 an
hour, to find and produce EBT cards showing large balances.
Set aside the absurdity of that estimate (how many people could it
possibly take to produce a spreadsheet!). We’re deeply troubled when
any public officials uses their control over public records — yes,
*public records* — in an effort to thwart bad-news stories.
The Associated Press was initially quoted a fee of $1 million to
cover its request for alternate government email addresses used by
high-ranking officials at the U.S. Department of Labor, for example,
before officials realized what they were doing was illegal.
Secretary of State William Galvin’s office urges state agencies to
waive fees for access to public records. When one of its critics
came calling, the Patrick administration chose to ignore that
advice. That’s not democracy. That’s payback.
The Boston Herald
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Official ‘happy’ to review welfare audit data
By Matt Stout
The state’s top health official yesterday backed off the Patrick
administration’s criticism of a scathing state audit of the
scandal-wracked welfare department, saying his team is poring over
the report’s findings after a “good meeting” with Auditor Suzanne
Bump.
“I think we had questioned it initially,” Health and Human Services
Secretary John Polanowicz said of the audit, which found
taxpayer-funded benefits were being paid to more than 1,100 dead
people. “And now that we have the benefit of the data and how they
did their analysis ... we were happy she was able to give us the
data so we can look at our systems.”
Gov. Deval Patrick brushed off Bump’s May 28 audit, telling the
Herald that “99.9 percent” of welfare benefits are spent correctly,
even as state officials challenged the report’s findings. Bump’s
office fired back a letter, detailing the lapses found in the
Department of Transitional Assistance and offering to meet with
Polanowicz.
Officials huddled last week, Bump spokesman Christopher Thompson
said, and emerged with a “renewed commitment to cooperation.”
Also yesterday, Polanowicz promoted Stacey Monahan to DTA
commissioner after she served four months as interim chief. Monahan
won plaudits for creating a 100-day plan aimed at rooting out waste
and fraud in the embattled agency. The plan came in the wake of an
inspector general’s report that found $25 million in EBT money went
to recipients who may not have been eligible. Saying Monahan has
done a “good job” and gotten good reviews from lawmakers, Polanowicz
decided to promote her even before her plan produced results.
“As you can imagine, sometimes it’s easier to do things with the
title of commissioner than it is as acting,” Polanowicz said. “So I
thought it was important to support her so she can continue the
work.”
The Boston Herald
Tuesday, June 11, 2013
Monahan named new head of embattled DTA
By Matt Stout
The state’s embattled Department of Transitional Assistance has
removed the interim tag from Commissioner Stacey Monahan’s job
title, formally naming her to head an agency that has come under
heavy fire over its ability to root out fraud.
Monahan, who replaced Daniel Curley in February in the wake of a
damning Inspector General report, officially takes over just weeks
after state Auditor Suzanne Bump released a report blasting the
department for doling out benefits to more than 1,100 dead people.
Since heading the agency, Monahan has rolled out a 100-day plan
officials say is targeted at better tracking welfare fraud, ordered
a still-pending independent review of the department and embarked on
a “listening tour” across 22 communities.
Several lawmakers have praised her work, including Senate President
Therese Murray, who herself is crafting what’s promised to be a
massive bill aimed at welfare reform. But some critics have said
they still want to see results from her initiatives before buying
into the changes.
Monahan, the former chief of staff for the Executive Office of
Health and Human Services, once served as executive director of the
Massachusetts Democratic Party.
The announcement came as Health and Human Secretary John Polanowicz
named three other high-ranking appointments in his department.
Peter Forbes has been tapped to lead the Department of Youth
Services, replacing Ed Dolan after he was named the state’s
probation commissioner; Kathy Betts is the new assistant secretary
for Children, Youth and Families; and Regina Marshall takes over as
the department’s Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Office of
Disability Policy and Programs.
Polanowicz, in a statement, called the group a “strong and
experienced team.”
The Boston Herald
Thursday, June 13, 2013
Proposed EBT reforms call for fingerprinting some recipients
By Matt Stout
The House Ways and Means committee will consider a series of new EBT-focused
reforms in its forthcoming supplemental budget — just weeks after
the release of a damning audit aimed at the state’s embattled
welfare system, the Herald has learned.
Among the proposals to be reviewed by the committee tomorrow:
• The installation of a fingerprinting comparison system to prevent
duplicate benefits;
• Establishing a timeline to put photos on EBT cards;
• Prohibiting most recipients from using placeholders for Social
Security numbers after three months;
• And requiring the assets and incomes of sponsors to be considered
when weighing benefits for immigrants.
The proposals, if cleared by the committee, would be part of the
supplemental budget filed on Monday. They would mark the first
action by House lawmakers since state Auditor Suzanne Bump released
her May 28 review that found the state Department of Transitional
Assistance had doled out millions in benefits to more than 1,100
dead people.
The House had already passed some welfare reforms in its initial
budget, including adding photos to EBT cards and creating a $300,000
Bureau of Program Integrity headed by an appointee of the Inspector
General to oversee fraud detection practices in the DTA.
But the new proposals, in some cases, strengthen those reforms or
add to them.
If filed by the committee, they then have to go before a vote by the
full House.
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