'Lacking basic skills'?' Here's some $$

Article 6-1-09

A look at qualifications for summer jobs

by Howie Carr
DNN Staff - EXCLUSIVE!
Monday, Jun. 1, 2009

Eagle Scouts need not apply. Valedictorians, ditto.

So you say English is your native language? Tough break, kid.

You live with your mother and your father? Strike 2.

Never been arrested? Strike 3, you’re outta here.

Come back after you drop out of school, or get pregnant.

Now comes the latest memo from the Department of Transitional Assistance, formerly known as welfare. If you liked the welfare Cadillac program, you’ll love the “DTA Youth Works/Summer Employment program.”

The flacks for the welfare-industrial complex are trying to put a shine on this sneaker, saying it’s all about helping “at-risk” youth. But Deval Patrick’s hacks can’t run away from their own list of requirements on page 2 of the May 18 memo.

“The client must meet one of the following criteria:

“ . . . lacking basic skills; pregnant or parenting; the child of a single working parent; a school dropout; homeless or a runaway; court-involved or an offender; or an ESL (English as a Second Language) learner; or an immigrant.”

In other words, if you’re a middle-class kid, struggling to make ends meet, you’re bleep out of luck. (Unless, of course, your uncle happens to be a solon, in which case, no problemo, kiddo.)

The DTA says anyone they hire has to be “low-income,” which I understand. But, if your father did the unthinkable and married your mother, and still lives with his family, then why is that a strike against the kid?

By the way, the money from the DTA summer job is “noncountable income for cash assistance.” In other words, you get to stay on the dole while you’re being paid to work.

According to the memo, the money for this program is coming from the stimulus funds, which we were told would be helping everybody, not just pregnant high-school dropout criminals.

So where is the empathy for the Dave and Ricky Nelsons of the 21st century? But then, the dirty little secret is out. When Sonya Sotomayor or Barack Obama talk about empathy, what they really mean is favoritism.

And there is no empathy anywhere for taxpayers. Remember the illegal-alien in-state tuition bill of 2006? It would have effectively provided free college tuition for any illegal who drifted into the state, while charging high out-of-state tuition for New Hampshire kids whose parents work and pay income taxes in Massachusetts. That one was stopped, temporarily, but it’ll be back.

Meantime, we have this DTA Youth Works/Summer Employment boondoggle.