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November 20, 2003
The Honorable E. Clay Shaw, Jr.
Chairman, Social Security Subcommittee
House Ways and Means Committee
Room B-316 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington DC 20515
The Honorable Charles E. Grassley
Chairman, Senate Finance Committee
Room 219 Dirksen Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Dear Chairmen Shaw and Grassley:
I am writing on behalf of the Ticket to Work and Work Incentives Advisory Panel (the Panel) to urge the reauthorization and increased funding of the Benefits Planning, Assistance, and Outreach (BPAO) and Protection and Advocacy (P&A) programs created by the Ticket to Work and Work Incentives Improvement Act of 1999 (TWWIIA). The current authorization for these grant programs will expire at the end of Fiscal Year 2004. The Panel urges Congress to act before the current authorization expires to ensure the continuity of these critical services for people with disabilities attempting to go to work. These two programs, which provide benefits planning, outreach and advocacy services to SSI recipients and SSDI beneficiaries, are vital to people with disabilities and the success of the Ticket to Work and Self-Sufficiency Program.
The decision to attempt to go to work is a complex and scary one for beneficiaries of SSDI and recipients of SSI. Social Security work incentives are very complicated and may appear to be inconsistent, especially for people receiving benefits from both programs. In addition, a work attempt can affect a myriad of other benefits, both state and Federal, that a person may be receiving. Having a well developed understanding of how to best use the work incentives available and create a plan to achieve self–sufficiency can make the difference between a successful work attempt and a lifelong dependence on benefits.
Until the BPAO program was established by the TWWIIA, beneficiaries seeking to return to work lacked readily available access to assistance. Since its inception, 484 benefits planners have assisted over 82,000 beneficiaries, over 49,000 in the past twelve months, with information or helped them navigate these complex processes and plan to go to work.¹ This is an impressive number of people served, but according to beneficiaries and state delivery service systems there are still not enough benefit planners to address clearly documented needs.
In some areas, people have to wait weeks for initial appointments, which may discourage beneficiaries or be too late to help them. Many others do not have access to a benefits planner at all. Due to the current levels of funding for some grantees, a single benefits planner may be expected to serve an entire state, as is the case in Delaware and South Dakota. The agency awarded the cooperative agreement in Wyoming actually returned the grant because they could not begin to address the statewide need with the $50,000 they had been awarded.
The number of benefits planners must be increased to ensure a better BPAO counselor to beneficiary ratio so that every beneficiary, no matter where they live in a state, has access to timely benefits planning services for return-to-work purposes. The overall funding level of the program should be significantly increased to accomplish this.
The Panel has received extensive public comment in support of the BPAO program. This support has come from a wide variety of sources – people with disabilities, their advocates, Employment Networks, state agencies and Federal officials. SSA informed the Panel at its last meeting that they are about to release the results of the BPAO Customer Satisfaction Survey, the results of which SSA said are highly supportive of the program. In addition, states are just beginning to report data of positive outcomes for beneficiaries who receive BPAO services. For example, beneficiaries in New York who receive BPAO services become employed at a higher rate and stay employed for more quarters than those who do not.² Vermont just released findings that beneficiaries attempting to go to work who received benefits counseling services significantly increased their earnings as compared to beneficiaries who did not.³ It is important to note that approximately one-third of the BPAO customers are SSI recipients and their earnings from work would be subject to the $1 for $2 benefit offset provisions in the SSI Program. The Panel is very encouraged by these findings and believes that, given time and the proper levels of funding, the BPAO program will significantly increase the independence of people with disabilities and decrease the public expenditures made on their behalf. The Panel urges Congress to continue this highly regarded and successful program and double the authorized funding level to $46,000,000.
The Protection and Advocacy program authorized under TWWIIA has also proven essential in assisting beneficiaries in returning to and maintaining work. P&A programs have provided information and advocacy services to over 13,000 individuals as of November 30, 2002. With the expansion of the scope of advocacy services allowable under their grant funds, P&A grantees have greatly increased their ability to assist beneficiaries. In its latest Annual Report to the President and the Congress Year Three, the Panel expressed great concern regarding the prohibition by the Social Security Administration against using grant funds to provide advocacy to beneficiaries regarding overpayments. Since the publication of that report, the Panel is pleased to note that SSA has lifted that restriction and P&A programs have begun to represent beneficiaries in those matters.
Receiving an overpayment, or the mere possibility of receiving one, can be the single greatest deterrent from attempting work. Beneficiaries who receive an overpayment due to work are very likely to discontinue employment and return to the rolls. According to the General Accounting Office, outstanding SSI debt and newly detected overpayments for the year 2001 totaled 4.7 billion dollars. 4
The Panel has also received extensive public comment on the value of the P&A program to beneficiaries who wish to return to work. The continuation of the P&A program authorized under TWWIIA is clearly essential to ensuring the success of the Ticket Program, but the current authorization level is not adequate to meet the need. The current funding allocated to each project, with the majority of states receiving only $100,000, cannot possibly allow P&A programs to represent the beneficiaries who require their assistance. In many states, that grant amount will not even support the hiring of one attorney to provide advocacy to SSA beneficiaries. And when the Ticket Program is fully implemented, the need for services from the P&A projects will only increase. For these reasons, the Panel supports the reauthorization of this program, an increase in the minimum amount of each state grant to $200,000, and increased funding for the program as a whole to $14,000,000 per fiscal year.
The Ticket Program is just entering the third phase of implementation. More than 3.5 million beneficiaries in 20 states will be receiving their tickets in the mail over the next 10 months. This is a very important time to maintain and strengthen these support programs. We know that BPAO contacts increase 100 percent in a state when the Ticket Program is rolled out in that state. The Social Security Administration is just beginning to evaluate the Ticket Program’s impact in removing some of the barriers and disincentives people with disabilities face when going to work. During this critical implementation period it is essential that the BPAO and P&A programs remain in place and receive the necessary resources to respond to the identified needs.
Your consideration of these recommendations from the Ticket to Work and Work Incentives Advisory Panel is appreciated.
Sincerely,
Sarah Wiggins Mitchell, Chair
cc:
The Honorable President George W. Bush
The Honorable Max S. Baucus
Committee on Finance
The Honorable Rick Santorum,
Chairman, Social Security Subcommittee
The Honorable Bill Thomas
Chairman, House Ways and Means
The Honorable Charles Rangel
House Ways and Means Subcommittee
JoAnne Barnhart, Commissioner
Social Security Administration
The Honorable Robert Matsui
Social Security Subcommitte
The Honorable John Breaux
Social Security Subcommittee
National BPAO Data System, Virginia Commonwealth University - Benefits Assistance Resource Center, includes data reported as of September 30, 2003
Data obtained from New York Works, New York State Department of Labor, November 2003
"The Impact of Specialized Benefits Counseling Services on Social Security Administration Disability Beneficiaries in Vermont," accepted for publication in the Journal of Rehabilitation. The article reports findings that beneficiaries who received specialized benefits counseling increased their earnings $225 per quarter more than people who did not receive counseling or members of an historical control group.
General Accounting Office.2002. Supplemental Security Income: Progress Made in Detecting and Recovering Overpayments, But Management Attention Should Continue. 02-849. Washington, DC.
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