Life's about to get much more difficult for 1,769 on disability

The bad news is in the mail for 1,769 state residents who have been living on state disability stipends.

They’ll be out of the program next month.

Struggling with the state budget, legislators this year did what their predecessors have tried to do: They killed the General Assistance Unemployable program and replaced it with the tighter Disability Lifeline.

That has the potential to be a good thing, both for taxpayers and for people unable to make it on their own because of mental or physical disabilities.

What’s worrisome is the way it’s being handled up front, with a lack of warning and coordination with agencies that can help.

GAU, a state program paid for with state taxpayers’ money, was intended as a temporary measure. If, say, a construction worker broke her leg in a car wreck, GAU would tide her over the months until she could go back to work.

If she broke her back and was permanently disabled, the idea was that she would get by on GAU until she completed the lengthy and complex process of getting onto Social Security.

Those two options remain with Disability Lifeline.

There’s also a new requirement for people to get drug and alcohol treatment if they need it. There’s emphasis on connecting with veterans’ services and job training, and to get clients onto SSI if they meet the standards.

What will go away, thankfully, is the limbo in which many GAU recipients have lived.

Instead of getting back to work, or onto SSI, they lived for years on GAU benefits. These amount to about half the $674 they should get with SSI, plus Medicaid.

Disability Lifeline ends that limbo by capping benefits at 24 months in a 60-month period.

So far, so good.

But that limit is retroactive, which means about 5,000 people statewide hit the limit that goes into effect in September.

Since the legislation passed, DSHS has been reviewing files, sorting out clients who should be on SSI. In most cases, the reviews were of paperwork and did not include an interview with the person involved.

Now the sorting is done, and 1,769 people did not make the cut. Of them, 612 are in King County, 217 are in Spokane County and 204 are in Pierce County.

Of those people, 1,244 are 40 or older, and 70 percent are white.

On Friday, the state mailed them letters telling them they will lose their modest cash and medical benefits.

On paper, all of this looks pretty good: People who ought to be on SSI get on that track, and people who ought to be working get off their duffs.

In reality, it’s not so simple.

That’s why 27th District state Rep. Jeannie Darnielle and Sen. Debbie Regala called a meeting this week with 150 social services providers and Eddie Rodriguez, DSHS Region 5 administrator.

Rodriguez admitted DSHS had not warned the people that they will be losing their assistance, and that the housing assistance legislators wanted is not in place. Further, federal privacy rules prohibit him from sharing the names with the providers who work with them.

Many of the recipients are damaged souls, not loafers, said Roberta Marsh of South Sound Outreach Services.

The news will hit them like a bomb, she said, assuming they get the letter. And assuming they can comprehend it.

“We take the people who are least able to manage and give them the most complex system to navigate,” she said.

More than half of them have a diagnosed mental illness. Many have next to no education and no resources. They live in shelters or rent rooms, depend on meal sites and may self-medicate.

They don’t have the skills and resources to gather all their medical and mental health files for the bid to get on SSI. Now there’s almost no time for their advocates to help them do so.

The best they can do is file costly emergency appeals and hope landlords have patience.

It’s a poor, and expensive, start for what should be a better way of dealing with some of the neediest and most damaged among us.

Kathleen Merryman: 253-597-8677 kathleen.merryman@thenewstribune.com blog.thenewstribune.com/street