Lawmakers on Tuesday said they want the state’s Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program to improve how it verifies recipients are working.
The Legislative Post Audit Committee discussed the issue while receiving two audit reports dealing with programs meant to help low-income Kansans.
Rep. Jason Probst, D-Hutchinson, used his experiences as executive director of Circles of Hope Reno County to relay examples of how the process can work. He said accessing benefits while working can make life “very, very complicated.”
“The places we’re asking them to go to check in to get these benefits are open during business hours, and often they have to take time off work, which then results in them losing their job,” he said. “So we have a system that really doesn’t encourage functional employment.”
Rep. Sean Tarwater, R-Stilwell, asked whether the Legislature needed to address the issue.
“Are we really that inflexible?” he asked. “Are we making people leave work, take time off work to come check in to tell us they’re working?”
The Kansas Department for Children and Families has a contractor reviewing its Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, commonly known as “TANF,” employment service to determine effectiveness, overlaps and service gaps, said Carla Whitehead-Hick, the department’s director of economic and employment services.
“Based on the recommendations from CIA [Change and Innovation Agency], I anticipate some significant changes in how we engage our clients,” she said, adding the report should be complete by the end of September.
Tarwater wondered why the state couldn’t just fix the issue rather than “taking months and months and years to do [so].”
“This clearly has been an issue for a very long time,” he said. “Why are we just now looking at it? Why do we need a report to tell us it’s an issue?”
Whitehead-Hick, who started her role 18 months ago, said she feels like she’s now in a position “to make changes that need to be made if we’re truly committed to serving Kansans.”
Temporary assistance audit
The audit on the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program had a focus on the cash assistance it provides.
Auditors examined two questions:
- How has the percentage of funding provided directly to families changed over time?
- What impact have changes to rules since 2011 had on program outcomes?
Auditors reported mixed opinions regarding the second question.
Since 2011, the Legislature passed various rules that reduced families’ total lifetime cash benefit eligibility to 24 months from 60, increased the penalties for work requirement noncompliance and required recipients to complete work skills assessments.
The report said studies across the nation suggested those types of rules have led to mostly negative outcomes, and some data could be seen as positive or negative depending on the viewpoint.
The Foundation for Government Accountability estimated the combined income of 6,000 families leaving the program between October 2011 and March 2015 grew to $67.6 million annually from $19.5 million.
But the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities noted the same data shows the average family would’ve earned $11,100 annually, which is still below the poverty line.
Nine percent of Kansas’ $102 million in federal funding for the program went to cash assistance in fiscal year 2023. Cash assistance represented 15% of spending in fiscal year 2009, but the report said more people received benefits at that point.
The average number of Kansas families receiving benefits monthly dropped to 2,900 in fiscal year 2023 compared to 12,600 in fiscal year 2009.
Sen. Caryn Tyson, R-Parker, expressed concern about the administrative costs, which represented 13% of spending in fiscal year 2023.
“I don’t want to overstep here, but I just think that’s a lot of money to administer this program,” she said.
Whiteside-Hick pointed out that the money includes department salaries as well as administrative costs associated with the 50 programs that the department funds through the block grant.
Rep. Barbara Ballard, D-Lawrence, requested the audit. Auditors didn’t make any recommendations in the report.
Low-income housing audit
Auditors’ review of the low-income housing tax credit revealed that Kansas’ program aligns with the expectations set by federal and state law as well as best practices.
“KHRC [Kansas Housing Resources Corporation] is tasked with ensuring that developers and owners comply with federal and state rules and do all the things they said they would do when they received the credit,” the report said. “Although detailed, KHRC’s compliance process is designed to ensure that federal rules are followed and best practices are implemented.”
The audit sought to answer two questions:
- How do the corporation’s requirements and monitoring processes for compliance reports, lease approvals, and rent approvals for the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit program compare to federal and state law?
- Are the corporation’s requirements for reserves and land use restrictions covenants consistent across low-income tax credit housing developments?
The program is intended to encourage affordable rental housing through tax credits to offset construction costs. Developers would receive the credits over a 10-year period, subsidizing up to 30% or 70% of construction costs depending on whether the development is new construction or a rehabilitation project.
Auditors identified two requirements — submitting training certificates and completing fair housing activities — that they didn’t consider a federal or state rule or best practice.
“Although these tasks are unnecessary, they don’t appear to be onerous or unreasonable,” the lead auditor said, using survey results to back up the statement.
Only 1 of 16 developers said completing the fair housing activities was time consuming or costly and 2 out of 15 had the same complaint about submitting training certificates, according to the survey in the audit report.
Bryan Richardson is the managing editor at State Affairs Pro Kansas/Hawver’s Capitol Report. Reach him at [email protected] or on X @RichInNews.