Pilot Welfare Plan Hits a New Roadblock

Two-thirds of the way through a six-month pilot program and still nobody at the wheel.

So it goes with a new county welfare-to-work plan set up to sell three donated cars to former welfare recipients who have found jobs.

The cars, one a former county fleet car and the other two donated by Bank of America, have been fixed, buffed and repaired to meet air pollution laws.

The recipients have been selected, their loans approved by a local credit union, their liability insurance cards at the ready.

However, the county’s innovative welfare reform program has been hitting one red light after another.

If developing the loan program, screening the applicants and getting all the legal bugs ironed out wasn’t bad enough, there was the lost smog certificates and the misplaced titles.

“I can’t believe it,” said Supervisor Frank Schillo, who came up with the idea in December. “It’s just been a series of boondoggles trying to get this thing accomplished.”

And it gets worse.

Just days ago, when they thought that all the roadblocks had been removed, officials said they were trying to transfer a tax-exempt county fleet car into private hands, which resulted in another mound of unexpected Department of Motor Vehicles paperwork.

Cities and counties auction off aging fleet vehicles all the time. But the county leaves that job to professional auctioneers, officials say. The county just gets a check in the mail.

“We’re kind of new to this,” admitted Jim Becker, the Human Services Agency official coordinating the program. “We’re not used-car dealers.”

Still, the county’s trail-blazing officials remain hopeful.

The program--believed to be among the first of its kind in the nation--was never designed to be an end-all solution.

And now that the kinks are ironed out, proponents hope that either a new or already existing nonprofit agency will be willing to take over the program.

The idea is that car owners could donate their old but still tax-deductible cars to the nonprofit group. The group would then sell the car to a former welfare recipient and keep the money to support the organization.

Although half of the 8,600 families who received Aid to Families With Dependent Children before welfare reform are believed to have problems with reliable transportation, officials point out that the car program was never designed to meet all the existing need.

The idea of the county guaranteeing car loans for welfare recipients was designed as just one possible solution to what welfare reform supporters say is the most pressing reform issue to overcome: a lack of car ownership and inadequate access to public transportation among aid recipients.

Instead, the pilot program--and $7,000 from the county to guarantee the first three loans--was more of an experiment.

Although some argue that the program is just another form of welfare, Becker said the county wants to see whether there is a way to help welfare recipients obtain car loans and usher them into independence.

“This is not a grant,” Becker said. “This is a loan. What we’re doing is providing people access to loans they wouldn’t have otherwise.”

Officials say the pilot program’s remaining glitches should be resolved soon, and the three women selected for the program will sign their final loan documents Tuesday.

For now, the recipients continue to rely on family members, public transportation and bicycles to get their children to school or day care and themselves to their recently acquired part-time jobs. Their income is supplemented by reduced public aid that, under state welfare reform law, expires after two years.

The women, each with between two and four children, were approved for the program following reviews of their driving and credit histories.

The Ventura County Credit Union is the actual lender, issuing 48-month standard interest loans with the understanding that the county will make good on the loans if the owners default.

And despite the problems, officials believe that the learning curve has been mastered and, as planned, a nonprofit agency will soon be willing to continue the program.

“We’ve worked out all the bugs,” Schillo said. “No question about that.”