A few days ago, fellow Capitol Watchblogger Thomas Cook continued the fight against Governor Daniels’ effort to modernize the state welfare eligibility system.  The debate over the privatization of this important function will likely wage on until the balance of the ten-year contract with the private consortium comes to an end.

This past week, opponents of modernization pointed to some old data that showed a drop in the growth of food stamp enrollment as evidence that citizens are falling through the cracks of the new system.  This was a crafty public relations effort launched ahead of a legislative hearing that took place on Wednesday where a bill was heard that would replace private contractors with state employees.  I guess the opponents of modernization, which include public employee unions, would rather have government continue to fail than risk a private solution.

It’s worth mentioning that food stamp enrollment is currently growing in modernized counties at a pace of 3% using current numbers.  Prior to modernization, FSSA gave away tens of millions of dollars in assistance to people who didn’t qualify for it while people who did were stranded on the nation’s longest waiting lists.

Incompetence in determining welfare eligibility in Indiana is nothing new, it’s actually a decade-old tradition.  I don’t remember any protests at the statehouse prior to 2005 calling on Governors Kernan, O’Bannon, or Bayh to even acknowledge the problem, much less pursue any solution.  Modernizing this process was necessary to replace a paper-based system that was awash in inefficiency, fraud, and waste that earned Indiana a place among states with the nations’ longest waiting lists and poorest welfare-to-work rates.

The state could not have adopted such reform without significant amounts of capital investment so a private-sector solution was the best answer.  Of course, private-sector solutions are always suspected and usually opposed without any other reason than because they are private-sector solutions.

The public’s tolerance for incompetence in government is nearly limitless, which is why this problem got a free pass for so many years.  The minute that a private solution was considered every person who couldn’t get help was a victim of corporate greed, not a wasteful bureaucracy.

This is a problem that needs solving.  People who need help should get it.  Welfare caseworkers should be just that, not paper-shufflers lost in 80′s technology.  When the public relations campaign against privatization stops, maybe we can have a meaningful discussion on how this system should operate.  Until then, those working everyday to make the system a little better will just have to take their lumps from the government-knows-best crowd and know they’re doing the right thing to improve the condition of our state’s vulnerable citizens.