Gnats, camels, and kids

 The recent clothing voucher kerfuffle would have been entertaining to watch if not for the harm that’s been done to thousands of children and the slander dumped on the heads of struggling low-income families--of which we have many in West Virginia--from the state’s highest office.

Let’s start with the changing story for shortchanging this vital program that’s been around for decades.

First, the delay in starting the program this year was blamed on a structural deficit for the Temporary Assistance for Needy Programs. That’s debatable, but at least it’s potentially a starting point for a realistic argument.

Then, there was pulling the plug on the delayed program after only a week due to the claim that there was no money. The program, if funded at last year’s level, would have cost around $11.4 million. In early July, the governor’s office announced a $370 million revenue surplus. The arithmetic isn’t exactly self-evident.

By early August, the story shifted to insulting claims about parents using the voucher electronic benefit cards (EBTs) for beer and cigarettes.

Imagine how it would look in other situations if someone kept changing the story.

It’s also striking to me that clothing vouchers are subject to this kind of evidence-free accusation while the much more expensive Hope Scholarship gets a pass.

The clothing voucher is worth $200 per child. The Hope program costs over $5,000 per student with no guardrails, or 25+ times more. By the end of the last fiscal year, this cost the state around $155 million. The legislature allocated $277 million for the 26/27 school year, again over 25 times more than the voucher cost last year.

Talk about a lot of beer and cigarettes.

Is the unequal scrutiny of the two programs because the vouchers are specifically for low-income families while even the wealthy can get Hope? I guess it’s easier to punch down, although I’ve never seen the attraction of it.

 That kind of glaring contradiction reminds of a saying of Jesus, who condemned hypocrites for “straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel” (Matthew 23:24).

Supposedly, the beer and cigarettes caper was made possible because the voucher benefits are now delivered by an EBT card. However, as journalist Steven Allen Adams noted,

“The School Clothing Allowance used to be a paper voucher, but the previous administration of former Gov. Jim Justice made it an EBT card instead, allowing greater flexibility for families to extract those funds for places that don’t accept EBT cards to purchase clothes and back-to-school supplies. The previous paper voucher system also was a pain for retailers and also meant waiting long periods for reimbursement from DoHS.”

If state leaders want to go back to the paper voucher system, fine. They can do that next year. But that’s no reason to hurt the families who need help the most now.