In a perfect world, body odor would be an aphrodisiac, teachers and scientists would be rewarded like celebrities, and politicians would be great humanitarian thinkers. Impossibilities? Well, improbable at the very least. The smells we produce and the tendency to value a pretty face over education are human flaws. But why we are at the mercy of politicos who do not help us when we try to help ourselves is less understandable. A classic scenario demonstrating our own servitude to political stubbornness and ignorance is evident in the current struggle to amend Pennsylvania’s welfare program.

Last year, Auditor General Bob Casey Jr. held over a dozen public hearings calling for the immediate revision of the meager children’s allowance in the previous welfare design. Desperate parents packed each hearing to capacity hoping that their stories would reach the governor or the Department of Public Welfare (DPW). Unfortunately, even though invitations were sent to each specific department, both the Ridge Administration and DPW representatives were much too busy to attend even one of these forums.

Still, public outcry suddenly at least temporarily transformed the state legislators into benefactors of the tired, poor, and huddled masses. They took the necessary political action and the sought-after amendment became part of the law.

But now it’s time for the public hinge to squeak again for another drop of oil. In 1996 when the federal government enacted Act 35, making the sweeping welfare reform of forcing a 20-hour work week onto those who been on welfare for more than 24 months, they did so with the intention of leaving an open end to allow individual states to customize their own programs.

Pennsylvania lags behind in doing so, however. According to Casey’s office, the Ridge’s Administration’s rigid application of this work requirement has created a "Catch-22" for many working mothers. "[They] are supposed to become self-sufficient by working, but they are currently denied the opportunity to pursue education and training so that they can actually obtain jobs that pay family-sustaining wages," Casey and legislators wrote in their letter to Ridge. "These policies are blatantly unfair and shortsighted. They penalize hardworking parents who are doing everything that they can to fulfill their obligations under welfare reform and also make the long journey to self-sufficiency."

This spring, the Pennsylvania Cable Network (PCN) (the channel that viewers often miss because it so resembles CSPAN) aired a public plea to have our political leaders plug in their common sense and decency and customize the program in Pennsylvania. PA Senate Democratic Leader Robert Mellow, Rep. Phyllis Mundy (D-Luzerne), and Casey sat and listened to the stories of frustration that five working women have had to endure with DPW.

Three of these women, Nadine Scopelliti, Doreen Thomas, and Diane Converse had all been receiving public assistance for years as they tried to better themselves and their children’s lives. Scopelliti, Thomas, and Converse said they realized early on that they needed to further their education in order to get a job that would allow them to be self-sufficient. But college degrees don’t come in exactly 24 months for single mothers, whose spare time activities include taking care of a home, parenting, studying, filing endless paperwork to DPW, and if time permits, eating, and sleeping.

Scopelliti’s caseworker indiscreetly told her she had to quit school even though she was only a semester away from graduation. At the time, she was student teaching, and the eight hours she spent per day in the classroom or preparing for the next day didn’t qualify as "work hours" to DPW. Thomas was offered the same lack of encouragement when she was in nursing school and was threatened with a termination of assistance if she didn’t leave school immediately to work a (most likely dead-end, menial) job. Converse is currently facing a full family sanction of welfare benefits because DPW will not consider her 12 hours of job training each week as work.

All three of these women were working within the scope of the amendment’s intentions. They were requesting acknowledgement for their efforts, and they were at the end of their ropes but still trying to climb with whatever energy they could muster. But DPW didn’t see the point.

Not only does DPW have rules that deny families like Scopelliti’s, Thomas’, and Converse’s of the pursuit of happiness, but they also have bylines that endanger these women’s safety.

Nina Gould and Elsa Peterson pulled themselves and their children away from domestic violence hoping to raise healthy families. Peterson even took refuge in a shelter after leaving her abusive husband. Both found welfare to be the best temporary solution until they were able to reassemble their new lives.

However, Pennsylvania law requires women to name the fathers of their children to assist in the collection of child support, and in the process, Gould and Peterson’s addresses would have been disclosed to their partners. This practice needlessly endangers battered women. Logic seems to escape those running this Commonwealth. In certain forums, disclosing the address of a battered woman to her abuser would seem like being an accessory to a crime.

"Being on welfare is not fun. Poverty is not anyone’s idea of fun," said Peterson. This opinion is especially true of honest women who never dreamed they’d be beached on public assistance, and that profile, according to a number of studies conducted nationwide, describes the majority, not the minority, of welfare recipients.

One mother of three who is trying to snip the strings of welfare as best as she can, whom I shall call "Sally" here for her protection, ran a local business with her husband whom she trusted as a business and life partner. By the time she discovered that his "moderate drinking" was full-blown alcoholism, most of their bank accounts had been drained. In 1997, her husband fired her. In less than a year, they separated, the business went under, and she had to find a way to care for three children alone. Her husband had mismanaged their finances and tax filings so severely that the IRS got involved, creating a mess which Sally is still trying to clear up. She enlisted with every temp agency in the Central PA area, but without hard credentials, she was given unskilled, low-paying work. Sally refused to see her children go hungry.

After six weeks of waiting, Sally was interviewed and admitted into the welfare program. She received $497 a month, a sum that didn’t even cover her rent. She admits that the $350 worth of food stamps was very helpful, but what about the utilities, clothing, gas, and other bills? Sally sacrificed herself twice a week at the plasma center, donating her own blood, delivered phone books 10-12 hours a day for a small commission whenever that work was available, and researched every charitable nook just to keep her children from feeling the intense pain and humiliation that she was suffering. "It wasn’t their fault and I’d never let them believe that," she said. These women don’t see welfare as a hand out but as a hand up.

A few Central Pennsylvania organizations and individuals recognize this struggle as remarkable and are helping these families.

For example, HACC runs a job-training program that gives skills and knowledge to students to get better jobs by presenting themselves as more promising candidates. Cheryl Kearns, an instructor in this program, has connections to some very good employers. One employer that has helped tremendously is the PA Department of the Treasury. "They even hired on a student of mine that was seven months pregnant," exclaimed Kearns. "That’s practically unheard of." Pennsylvania Treasurer Barbara Hafer recently received an award recognizing these generous hiring practices.

It seems that everyone — except the departments assigned to — has something they can do to support these extraordinary women.

Karen Walsh, senior advisor for communications for the Auditor General’s office, has had to deal directly with the DPW for three-and-one-half years and her frustration was practically visible over the phone. "There is no encouragement [or] even simple compassion for these women and what they are trying to do for their families. It’s ridiculous," Walsh emoted. Not a huge percentage of mothers on public assistance attempt college as a way off, but, asks Walsh, "How many of them are discouraged by their caseworkers before they even consider attending school?"

Regardless of how ass-backward Pennsylvania’s DPW remains, there are a growing number of states in the union that do accommodate the self-improvement that these women want, proving it achievable.

"Texas, Maine, and Illinois are among the leaders of the idea that schooling and job training count toward the work requirement," informed Peter Zurflieh, an attorney for the Community Justice Project, a legal program representing low-income people across the state. "These women have no problems with working, but may be unable to make the strict twenty hours because of school. The ‘work first’ approach is not nearly as successful as [the lawmakers] thought it would be."

In Texas, care coverage is "below average," but the state does have a program which counts nearly any type of formal schooling and training against the 20-hour weekly work requirement. Maine and Illinois are runners up, each also having innovative approaches.

Pennsylvania, on the other hand, looks the other way when these women beg for a break. In an attempt to learn more from the agency itself about what improvements Pennsylvania is considering, MODE contacted DPW five times. Each time someone shuttled the call to the Press Office. "I’ll have some one call you" is a phrase that began to ring like the familiar "The check’s in the mail." DPW simply refused to respond.

Karen Walsh hand-delivered a PCN videotape of the testimony of the five women described earlier to the governor’s mansion three weeks ago. She has still heard nothing. She said that the buzz from the capitol as to why nothing has been done yet is that "there hasn’t been enough of a media uproar."

Apparently we have mindless machines in office who require a swift kick in order to realign their gears. And while their assistants prepare these professional politicians for the next televised ass-kissing, women have to sell their blood to feed their sons and daughters.

Women with children on public assistance are not second-class citizens. They are often strong, independent mothers who never wanted to rely on anyone, especially not Public Assistance, and are trying to make sure they never will again.

Send a message to the people who work for us. You know where they are.