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Update: Minnesota Gov. Mark Dayton and state
lawmakers reached a tentative budget agreement on July 14. They have set
a deadline of 10 p.m. July 15 to finish budget talks and hope to have
special legislative session on July 18.
By the Rev. Victora Rebeck*
7:00 A.M. EST July 12, 2011 | MINNEAPOLIS (UMNS)
Tona Reynolds and her children set the dinner table in their Emma’s
Place townhouse at Emma Norton Services in St. Paul. UMNS web-only
photos by Paul Jeffrey/Response.
“You can cut the anxiety in the air with a knife,” said Anne
Carlson, director of the Dignity Center, a ministry at Hennepin Avenue
United Methodist Church that helps people in poverty obtain a level of
self-sufficiency.
The Rev. Kevin Schill, who is watching more people visit the food
shelf at the Simpson Center for Servant Ministries, said, “People might
be responding out of fear” and stocking up on food.
“People are worried about losing general assistance, medical care,
child care, any service provided by government funds,” Carlson said.
Because Minnesota legislators failed to agree on a budget by June
30, the state government shut down. General assistance and a number of
other services continue under a court order that is to expire July 31.
Under that order, the services that continue include Medicaid/Medical
Assistance, Minnesota Family Investment Program, Diversionary Work
Program, Minnesota Supplemental Aid, Refugee Cash Assistance, Group
Residential Housing, Food Support, MinnesotaCare, Minnesota Food
Assistance Program and Adoption Assistance.
Other services that people rely on are not on this “deemed
critical” list. Many federal program funds distributed through the state
are languishing unpaid because of state staff layoffs.
“The context for this shutdown is that our government—reflecting
our general culture—has become so partisan that it finds it difficult
to make decisions that will help the common good,” said Bishop Sally
Dyck in an appeal for prayer sent July 8 to Minnesota United
Methodists. “The impact of the government shutdown is that many of the
most vulnerable in our state are or will increasingly be the ones who
once more bear the burden of our government’s inability to pass a
budget.”
“Right now we are processing a lot of food orders,” says Anne
Harnack, executive director of People Reaching Out to Other People in
Eden Prairie. “Generally, the beginning of the month is busier but it
seems to be a little extreme this week. We do anticipate those who have
lost child care assistance and mental health support will be
contacting us soon.”
Most churches allow their pastors a discretionary fund for walk-in
emergency requests. These funds are stretched beyond capacity.
A 7-year-old studies in an after-school tutoring program at Emma’s
Place, which long has been supported by United Methodist Women.
“I have experienced a 300-percent increase in the number of
subsistence-related requests from actual congregants since last week
when the shutdown went into effect,” says the Rev. John Darlington,
pastor of Simpson and Joyce United Methodist churches in Minneapolis.
“That contingency fund I have at my disposal will soon be depleted.”
The Rev. Chad Gilbertson, pastor of Willmar UMC in western Minnesota, says the same.
“We are seeing higher level of referral from the very organizations
that we normally refer people to for social services because they are
not getting the state funding that they usually receive.”
He expects parishioners will continue to support the discretionary
fund, "but not knowing how long the shutdown will last, their ability
to support the discretionary fund will be tapped out or they will have
to choose to support that or maintaining their regular level of giving."
Domino effect from child-care loss
Loss of state funding is straining United Methodist churches that house or offer child-care, which starts a domino effect.
“Many people who qualify for child-care subsidies are not receiving
them,” said Schill of the Simpson Center. “If they do not have a
family member or friend who can care for their children, they cannot go
to work. And, they can stay away from work only so long. They have
very real concerns about this.”
“The daycare that is housed in North United Methodist Church
[Minneapolis] is closed because all of the kids are from families that
use state subsidies to pay for their day care,” says the Rev. Linda
Koelman. “This means that the three regular caregivers are out of work.
“And, the person who does cleaning for both the church and day care
has had hours cut way down. And, it also means that it will be
impossible for the day care to pay their share of the utilities if they
have no income, so it hurts the church and cuts our income too.”
Barbara Patterson runs a computerized embroidery machine at Rebuild
Resources, a St. Paul company. Patterson is a resident at Emma Norton
Services.
Kid’s Care Connection, started in 2000 by Messiah United Methodist
Church in Plymouth, provides child care for families moving from
welfare to work.
“We scholarship half of the children enrolled in the center,” says
the Rev. Steve Richards, Messiah’s senior pastor. “Currently we have 10
families who are receiving a child-care subsidy through the State of
Minnesota. This amounts to a $6,000 loss to our child-care center each
month. Additionally, we receive $2,500 per month for a food program. An
area non-profit is helping with the loss of subsidy on a week-by-week
basis—as they have funds available.
“Kid’s Care is continuing the food program and is currently
absorbing the cost….If the state shutdown continues, there will come a
point where alternate sources of income will disappear and we may need
to reduce staff as families are no longer able to afford child care.”
Park Avenue Youth and Family Services (PAYFS), operating out of
Park Avenue United Methodist Church in Minneapolis, offers free meals
to youngsters taking part in its Urban Summer Academy for kids. It
relies on the state for reimbursement for the meals, and lacks other
funds to cover this expense, says Ann Bauer, PAYFS office and
communications coordinator.
Housing and shelter options depleted
The demand for affordable housing is great in Minnesota. Since the
May 22 tornado that hit a struggling northeast Minneapolis
neighborhood, that city’s housing and shelter options are quickly
depleting. Loss of state assistance adds more pressure.
“It is almost impossible to get people into housing,” says Carlson
of the Dignity Center. “We are hearing from people who’ve never been
homeless. They are like deer in the headlights. They don’t know how to
access the system, and the system is strapped.”
Volunteer Anthony Flores reads to children during the summer after-care
program at the Urban Summer Academy at Park Avenue Youth and Family
Services in Minneapolis. A UMNS web-only photo courtesy of Park Avenue
Church.
A woman recently called Carlson seeking help navigating the
system. A family shelter expects people to pay their Minnesota Family
Investment Program (MFIP) benefit of about $480 as rent to the shelter.
Residents also need to be looking for a job and have a job counselor.
This caller explained to Carlson that she used her MFIP benefit to
put her belongings in storage so she wouldn’t lose them and bought a
cell phone so she can communicate for job searches and other essential
purposes.
Carlson says county staff—“who are also under stress”—told the
woman she was essentially out of luck. Carlson knew that the county
policy is to find housing for parents and their children. Carlson
called the county to affirm this and urged the woman to revisit the
county offices.
“I also told her about Families Moving Forward. Families stay in
churches for a week at a time, and they receive food, showers, and
overnight lodging. They are moved again in a week. This is less
appealing, but it is an option.
“This is the kind of story I hear everywhere,” Carlson said.
Emma Norton Services, a Women’s Division ministry in St. Paul that
provides housing and other ministries for single women and women with
families, skirted problems when their residents’ benefits were put on
the “deemed critical” list. However, the shutdown prevents the ministry
from serving more women.
Services for homeless youth feel pinch
Youth on the streets are particularly vulnerable. The Rev. David
Bard, pastor of First United Methodist Church in Duluth, is on the
board of Life House, a ministry to homeless youth, which Bard says is
the only such ministry in Minnesota outside the Twin Cities. Life House
is losing about $6,000 a month from lost state support, causing them
to cut back on staff, he said.
Bruce Webster, a member of Eden Prairie United Methodist Church, is
a computer services consultant who finds himself at home despite
having been in the middle of a major project for the corrections
department.
Participants of the Iron Biker, a three day bike trek for
middle-schoolers, gather through the Urban Summer Academy at Park Avenue
Church. Park Avenue relies on reimbursement from the state for meals
for children in the Urban Summer Academy. A UMNS web-only photo courtesy
of Park Avenue Church.
“Once the government shut down, they basically suspended or
cancelled our contracts,” he says. “What is frustrating is that the
contract I am working is covered by federal funds, the Reinvestment in
Recovery Act. Yet I am told that because the funds flow through the
state and the state staff that distribute and report on the funds are
no longer employed, I can’t be paid for my work.”
Brunswick United Methodist in Crystal employs a cleaning crew
through Pillsbury United Community’s Employing Partners in Community
program, a day-training program for people with developmental
disabilities.
“We received a call last week that they would close until the state
government reopened,” says Cheryl Gibbons, the church’s office
manager. “The crew leader is employed by PUC and the crew must be
supervised according to state policies, so there will be no cleaning
crew until the state reopens.”
The church can handle a little dust, Gibbons says. But she learned
that “all of these guys look forward to coming to our church to ‘do
their job.’ It is sad for them.”
As the shutdown continues, Minnesotans grow more frustrated.
“(Legislators’ inability to agree on a budget) demonstrates a
withdrawal from the sense of community,” says a United Methodist who
works in the Minnesota legislative office of fiscal analysis and
prefers to remain unidentified. “That is so wrong. We are only as
strong as the weakest one in our community. It’s a mistake to think we
can go forward as a community without considering everyone.
*Rebeck is the Communications Director for the Minnesota Annual (regional) Conference.
News media contact: Maggie Hillery, Nashville, Tenn., 615-742-5470 or newsdesk@umcom.org.
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