DN Editorial: LIFE SENTENCE OF HUNGER
Taking drug criminals' food stamps makes matters worse
WHAT'S THE worst non-capital crime there is? Child abuse? Rape? Public corruption?
According to at least one of our state lawmakers, the worst crime you can commit is possessing enough drugs to warrant a felony conviction . . . which, in this state could be a small amount of marijuana, or a second offense for possession.
Rep. Mike Regan, R-Dillsburg, wants to impose a lifetime ban on food stamp and Temporary Aid to Needy Families benefits to anyone convicted of a felony drug offense. No similar ban applies to any other criminal category. Those convicted of other crimes who have served their sentence and are in compliance with parole can receive benefits. Drug convictions are the only ones that would draw a lifetime ban.
Since the majority of TANF and SNAP recipients are women with children, HB222 has very bad implications. The bill runs counter to current thinking that acknowledges the damage done by the "war on drugs," which has locked up a staggering percentage of the population - mostly black and Latino. This also runs counter to the increasing realization that unless we provide more help for those re-entering society, the revolving prison door will never stop spinning.
Regan is a former U.S. Marshal who has cited instances of arrests of drug traffickers who were receiving welfare benefits.
This strikes us as the kind of apocryphal story that always seems to rise up around those receiving benefits: like the recent account on Fox News of a young surfer who boasted of buying lobster with food stamps that went viral. Lawmakers across the land responded predictably, with some introducing measures that would ban food stamp recipients from buying steak and seafood.
Regan is not alone in this need to punish drug offenders with a life sentence. Congress passed a federal lifetime ban back in 1996, but allowed states to opt out. Pennsylvania did in 2004, an opt-out supported not only by the Pennsylvania District Attorneys Association but a variety of those who work with addictions, as well as with women and children.
They say punishing parents by withholding food and other benefits can undermine rehabilitation efforts, contribute to increased recidivism rates and undermine child health and family unity. Regan has said that he really wants the ban to curtail drug traffickers from receiving public benefits. But there are better ways to craft language that would better apply to that group.
The average monthly household benefit for food stamps last year in this state was $241.05, down from $262.61 in 2010. That $60 a week doesn't buy a lot of lobster, or even non-luxury food. But it can mean the difference between a hungry child and a healthy one - and can allow a mother who is trying to recover from an addiction and stay on the straight and narrow to succeed. HB222 is the kind of wrong-headed law intended to make its authors feel good and suggest that they're addressing a problem that many fear - poor people scamming the system - but in reality, rarely exists.