The Anti-Family Child Support War Mongers are clamoring their hammers on their shields because they don't think that an individual who benefits from their programs should have to pay a small $25.00 fee after receiving $500.00 or more dollars through the program. Bloggers at ReadExpress.Com and a few other sites have been disagreeing with the fee that is being imposed on the beneficiaries of the voluntary program.
I took the time to write about this exact issue when Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley was complaining of the same issue. You can view my initial response at the Nationwide Blueprint for Title IV-D Reform Website. Just like in Iowa and every other state in the United States of America, the State participation is voluntary. The States knew that the application fee was going to be a requirement and chose to sign up for the program anyways. Now they seek to change the rules and continue a trend of rewarding individuals and bureaucracies for negative outcomes instead of positive outcomes.
Just like in Iowa, The Virginia program suffers tremendous over participation of families that are 150% or higher above the poverty-line. Because of the significant level of over participation from wealthier families receiving voluntary services at no cost the failure of collections for the mandatory lower-income participants are going unnoticed while the program is being touted as a success. Essentially the mandatory participation in the state child support enforcement program by families receiving other forms of government assistance are being left behind while the state focuses on adding higher-income families and focusing resources on easier targets through income-withholding orders to continue maximizing federal funding received by the state of Virginia.
Similarly, since the super majority of the participants are families that are over the 150% threshold of poverty, there should be no reason that the beneficiaries of the programs, when proven successful, receive services at no cost. We need to reduce taxpayer burden and add proper eligibility requirements to restrict program participation. Free for all spending on these programs is irresponsible use of the taxpayer money and nothing more than fuel for a growing, federally subsidized, bureaucracy. When the federal funding dries up, the burden is going to become an immediate emergency associated with funding an oversized bureaucracy that will eventually rest on the shoulders of the local taxpayers that will not be able to foot the entire bill.
Bloggers need to understand the issues at hand before repeating the propaganda of State and Federal officials by doing a little research. Afterall, if they don't do the research they will be no better than the average news release service.
