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INCOME & WORK SUPPORTS UPDATE
NOVEMBER 2022

Advancing Disability Equity and Access in TANF and SNAP for People with Long COVID
This report recommends concrete actions policymakers and program administrators can take to improve accessibility of public programs for people with Long COVID and other disabilities. Throughout the report, we include quotes from interviews with people who have Long COVID about their experiences accessing public benefit programs and health care.
Read Report [[link removed]]
Read Executive Summary [[link removed]]

Secondary features
Oregon’s Groundbreaking Medicaid Waiver Sets New Bar for Equity
Oregon recently received approval to implement changes to its Medicaid program. Notably, the state will now provide continuous coverage for eligible children under age six, and 24 months of continuous coverage for eligible Oregonians who are six and older. The provisions will reduce administrative burdens for recipients, who won’t have to navigate the renewal process and its paperwork as frequently.
Read More [[link removed]]

For College Students Facing Poverty, Policymakers Must Lift Barriers to Economic Support
College students are often left out of public programs designed to help people meet their basic needs, such as the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). CLASP recently spoke with young people who made clear it’s time for state and federal policymakers to lift these barriers to their success. They must act to ensure college students can access these programs.
Read More [[link removed]]

In the News
October 19, 2022 | Mississippi Today
‘Downright sinful’: As Mississippi is mired in welfare scandal, advocates say the state still isn’t aiding the poor [[link removed]]

October 18, 2022 | Krebs on Security
How Card Skimming Disproportionally Affects Those Most In Need [[link removed]]

October 18, 2022 | Associated Press
Director: Mississippi does not track welfare program results [[link removed]]

October 7, 2022 | The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
One-time payouts to poor Georgians won’t solve the problem of poverty [[link removed]]

IWS updates
On October 18, Elizabeth Lower-Basch traveled to Jackson, Mississippi at the invitation of advocates to testify before the State House and Senate Democratic Caucuses on the use of funds in the state’s Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program. The program recently garnered national attention after a scandal exposed that the former agency head and his allies stole millions of dollars meant for Mississippi's poorest families. In her testimony, Elizabeth focused on the astonishing gap between the nearly 190,000 children in Mississippi living under the poverty level–disproportionately Black and Hispanic children–and the less than 2,000 families receiving cash assistance. She urged the legislature to better monitor TANF funds and develop a corrective compliance plan to avoid federal penalties and better meet needs. She was also pleased to meet Anna Wolfe in person, the Mississippi Today reporter whose investigative reporting has been central to public understanding of TANF in Mississippi. You can read Elizabeth's testimony here [[link removed]]

Also in October, Ashley Burnside traveled to San Diego, California to attend the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities’ (CBPP) TANF Advocate Conference. During the conference, attendees discussed state policy options to improve TANF and child support access for families with children. Ashley led table conversations about CLASP’s newly published report on “Advancing Disability Equity in TANF and SNAP for People with Long COVID,” and about EBT skimming instances in various states. CPG member Maryann Broxton also moderated the opening and closing plenaries for the conference.

Key publications and blogs
October 26, 2022 | Deanie Anyangwe and Whitney Bunts
Safer for Whom? The Bipartisan Safer Communities Act Does Not Actually Keep Communities Safe [[link removed]]

October 25, 2022 | Alycia Hardy
The Racist History Behind Why Black Childcare Workers Are Underpaid [[link removed]]

October 21, 2022 | Kailey Wilkens
Keeping Kids Equitably Fed through Child Care [[link removed]]

October 7, 2022 | Cameron Johnson, Emily Andrews, and Melissa Young
More Federal Action is Needed to Promote Equity and Growth in the Green Workforce [[link removed]]

Upcoming Events
Understanding Medicaid's Administrative Burdens as a Racial Equity Issue
Wednesday, November 9 2022
3-4pm ET / 12-1pm PT

This webinar will draw fromCLASP and CBPP’s recent paper, “States Can Reduce Medicaid’s Administrative Burdens to Advance Health and Racial Equity.” [[link removed]] Administrative burdens, including lengthy applications, requests for paper verification documents, and complex eligibility policy prevent eligible individuals from enrolling in Medicaid and staying enrolled. Topics covered in this webinar will include the nature and history of administrative burdens in Medicaid, how and why administrative burdens disproportionately affect people of color, and policy and advocacy solutions to alleviate them. Presenters will also discuss opportunities to reduce administrative burdens and advance racial equity as part of the “unwinding” of Medicaid from the public health emergency continuous coverage requirement, likely to occur sometime in 2023.
Register: [link removed]

 An Anti-Racist Vision for SNAP: Ensuring Food Justice for All
Thursday, November 17, 2022
1:00-2:30pm ET / 10:00-11:30am PT
Please join the Community Partnership Group (CPG) on Wednesday, November 17 at 1pm EST for a webinar exploring the changes needed in the SNAP program to move it in an anti-racist direction. By rejecting racist assumptions and not merely limiting ourselves to what is politically possible today, we can create a program that truly centers people with low incomes of all races and ethnicities—and that meets the need to put food on the table while doing so. 
Register: [link removed]

What we’re reading
Institute for Research on Poverty
Diaper Dilemma: Low-Income Families Face High Costs And Limited Supplies Of An Essential Good [[link removed]]

The New York Times
Turns Out Sometimes the Government Can Get Things Right [[link removed]]

The Guardian
I was given a house for free – but it already belonged to someone else [[link removed]]

Urban Institute
Advancing Equity, Climate Action, and Economic Health in Communities
[[link removed]]

National Bureau of Economic Research
Administrative Burdens and Child Medicaid Enrollments [[link removed]]

Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services
COVID-19 Public Health Emergency Unwinding Frequently Asked Questions for State Medicaid and CHIP Agencies [[link removed]]


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