Welfare and its abuses...

Whenever someone says we need to reform welfare and that there are abuses, the usual race bating poverty pimps come up and scream racism, people are hurting children, taking food from the mouths of babies, etc. Well from the old home state, some good news.

Louisiana bans use of welfare benefits for tattoos, lingerie, jewelry

BATON ROUGE, La. – Louisiana welfare recipients will be prohibited from spending the federal assistance at lingerie shops, tattoo parlors, nail salons and jewelry stores, under new limits enacted by state social services officials.

The Department of Children and Family Services announced the emergency regulations late Thursday. They cover the Family Independence Temporary Assistance Program — commonly known as welfare benefits — and the Kinship Care Subsidy Program.

Both programs pay cash assistance to low-income families for items like food, clothing and housing.

DCFS Secretary Suzy Sonnier said the agency decided to ban the use of electronic benefit cards, which work as debit cards, at stores that don't sell items that are considered basic needs for families.

"This rule will not affect families who currently use the program as intended, which is to provide food, shelter and clothing for families," Sonnier said in a statement.

About 3,500 households in Louisiana receive welfare benefits, and about 2,400 households get kinship care subsidies, according to the department. Average payments are $192 per month for welfare and $419 a month for kinship care.

The emergency regulations come a week after WAFB-TV in Baton Rouge reported that an Ascension Parish lingerie store posted a sign noting that it accepted the welfare benefits card along with most credit cards...

Here is the store door and it says they accept EBT. Now I don't know what is more absurd, this?



Or this?

...Also barred in the latest restrictions from taking welfare debit cards are video arcades, bail bond companies, cruise ships, psychics, adult-entertainment businesses, nightclubs, bars and any businesses where minors are not allowed....

...Last year, the social services agency enacted new regulations that banned the spending of welfare money on cigarettes, alcohol and lottery tickets. Those regulations also included prohibitions on the use of a welfare electronic benefit card at liquor stores, gambling sites and strip clubs, as required under a recently-passed federal law.

How in the hell was this allowed from the beginning?! When I worked at grocery stores in Louisiana during my first misguided college yute, before everyone accepted plastic, we had paper food stamps. The cash register would provide separate food and non-food totals and only the food items could be paid for with the stamps. Anything else and the buyer needed cash. How the hell was that ever changed?

Restrict sales to grocery and drug stores and then only for food items. We know there will always be a degree of abuse (e.g. exchange ten dollars in cash for 20 dollars in food stamp credit) but we don't need to make it easy.

Good work Louisiana.