Time limit strikes back: Cut in aid to needy families costs DES millions

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Jillian Vigil lost everything. Literally everything. As she was fleeing a domestic violence relationship, leaving nearly all her possessions behind, her partner even burned her Social Security card.

Gradually, the 34-year-old mother of five started to rebuild. She stayed at a shelter with her youngest child, while the four other kids lived with her ex-husband. Once she was out of the shelter and had her own place, she still needed help to pay for things like toilet paper and bus passes to get to job interviews.

The $235 monthly cash assistance she received from the federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program “saved my butt” for a full year, Vigil said.

But she’ll likely never be able to use the program again, thanks to a one-year lifetime limit put in place by state lawmakers effective in July 2016.

The TANF time limit isn’t only affecting people like Vigil — it’s hurting the Arizona Department of Economic Security’s bottom line.

Now, DES wants $9 million to help cover a shortfall in its child support division caused by repeated limits to TANF, according to a budget request it sent to the Governor’s Office. Without the backfill of funds, DES says its services, like finding child support scofflaws, could be hobbled.

The $9 million shortfall represents about 20 percent of the child support division’s annual budget, according to DES. The money helps track down non-custodial parents to get them to pay child support, establishes paternity in disputes, pays for court orders and ideally leads to more child support collected.

Read the full story at AZ Capitol Times

Corrie O'Connor