The Child Support Issue #FilltheStateHouse
When the legislative session closed without addressing
Medicaid expansion, I was heartbroken. Thousands of Idaho’s working poor would
again face the reality of life without access to medical care. But when I read about Idaho’s refusal sign
the child support treaty bill into law, I was furious. It seems that Idaho enjoys kicking its
working poor while they are down.
More
than 150,000 Idaho families utilize the Idaho Child Support system. The majority of those are single working mothers—a
part of the same demographic that is affected by lack of Medicaid expansion—who
may now lose child support that is vital to their survival.
If that scenario isn't bad enough,
it gets worse. Idaho’s refusal to sign
has further consequences, “Federal officials told the state Health and Welfare
Department on Monday that Idaho’s child support bureau will lose $16 million in
funding within 60 days without reversal… Without a child support program in
place, the state also stands to lose $30 million in temporary assistance to
needy families, which covers such programs as Head Start as well as child care
assistance for low income families.”
Thousands of Idaho children who
utilize Head Start will have nowhere to go and working parents who depend on
ICCP will have no means with which to pay for daycare. It is thought that Idaho’s refusal will touch
the lives of 400,000 Idahoans—those with active child support cases, those who
have pending cases, Head Start attendees and workers, ICCP clients and the
daycares and providers who accept that
subsidy, those who are employed by the Idaho Child Support offices.
I am one of those 400,000 directly
affected. If this comes to pass, I will lose my childcare business of 20 years--my
family’s sole source of support. All of
my daycare clients participate in the ICCP program. The five families I provide
care for will not be able to continue to work and children I have helped to
raise since they were tiny will be gone from my life. The only silver lining in
this cloud is that once we are destitute my husband and I will qualify for
Medicaid.
The New York Times recently ran an
article about the whole mess saying, “A major factor seems to be Idaho’s ornery
streak, the part of the state’s identity that does not like the federal
government — or, worse still, foreign governments — telling it what to do.” The article backed up this idea by quoting
Ryan Kerby, a Republican, first term representative as saying, ““You need to
sign it, and if you don't we're going to beat the crud out of you,” Mr. Kerby
said, paraphrasing the pressure he felt (from the federal government). “They
were incredibly rude.”
I could not then nor can I now fathom
how a dislike of federal control could be a deciding factor on an issue that
touches so many Idahoans. The Idaho
legislature is acting on principle but those principles have devastating
effects on real lives.
Idaho’s law making body is behaving
like a spoiled child balking under parental control. It is ridiculous behavior with horrendous
consequences and further proof that our governing body does not make decisions
based upon what is best for its constituents, but rather on how ornery it feels
on any given day. The working poor
cannot afford Idaho’s petulance.
