California's cuts to SSI could devastate people with disabilities there

From the San Jose Mercury News:

When California legislators finally finish wrestling with a $40 billion budget deficit, residents of all sorts will feel the pinch — school children and municipal workers, the developmentally disabled and unemployed parents.

But expected cuts to assistance for the blind, aged and disabled are deemed by poverty-watchers as among the most devastating, given the inability of those clients to, say, take on a second job to fill the gap.

Statewide, 1.3 million residents rely on shrinking Supplemental Security Income benefits, which help provide for basic needs but leave them ineligible for food stamps even as food costs soar. Cuts to the federal assistance program that includes an added state supplement appear likely, as Sacramento inches closer to a budget deal this week.

Basic monthly grants for individuals are expected to be reduced from $907 to $870. And Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is pushing for even lower grants — $830 a month — to save the state more than $1.3 billion a year beginning in May.

The governor has also called for the complete elimination of a similar program serving elderly, blind and disabled legal immigrants whose status as noncitizens makes them ineligible for federal SSI payments. But so far, Democrats have resisted ending the state program, known as Cash Assistance Program for Immigrants, which now serves almost 12,000 people. Eliminating the program would trim $149.6 million from the state budget between May 2009 and June 2010.

The prospect of cuts to either program is unsettling clients and advocates alike. "What are the old people gonna do? It's scary," said Don Goodwill, an SSI recipient who battles sickle cell anemia and currently spends his nights at the homeless shelter in Sunnyvale's National Guard armory.

Goodwill's monthly $940 SSI benefit already starts dwindling early in the month, when $125 goes to pay for his four medications. He keeps food costs to a minimum — mostly canned goods, bologna and McDonald's — but little is left for housing. Four annual hospital stays for blood transfusions complicate things further. "Once I get it, it's all gone," Goodwill said of the subsidy.

Agencies serving California's neediest residents say SSI cuts are likely to expand one of the state's fastest-growing homeless populations: senior citizens.

In Santa Clara County, 49,500 people receive SSI grants. Officials at downtown Palo Alto's Opportunity Services Center estimate three-fourths of the homeless center's clients receive the disability benefits.

In addition to offering drop-in clients a hot shower, a place to wash their clothes or healthy fare like fruit and salads, the center just off El Camino Real and University Avenue features a handful of affordable apartments with long waiting lists. Rents for the formerly homeless are as low as $650, but minimum income levels are required.

Program Director Philip Dah said even a small drop in SSI benefits could force some renters onto the streets. "If they lose $35 or so, they might not qualify for the unit," he said.

That's the situation facing Albert Mills, (pictured) a 56-year-old disabled man who just moved into the Opportunity Center after a period of homelessness. SSI cuts, he said, would send him "back to the concrete."