Govs Say Welfare Reform Necessary

The chance for national welfare reform in this session of Congress may have disappeared because of the recent Wall Street crash as well as renewed calls for action on the budget deficit, two state governors said in a panel discussion last night at the Kennedy School.

Governors William Clinton (D-Ark.) and Michael Castle (R-Del.), leaders of the lobby for national welfare reform, said most governors now agree that the country needs more employment training programs and other incentives to get people off of the welfare rolls. But they said congressional priorities and presidential politics may ruin the chances for such changes this year.

"If a House-Senate conference is not held very early in the spring, chances are [welfare reform] could get caught up in presidential politics," said Clinton, who co-chaired the governors' working group on welfare reform with Castle. He said the deficit and the crash have put new pressures on Congress that may force members to postpone a major project like this one.

"But we ought to put in place the best framework we can. If it's inadequate, we can fix it later," he added. "For now, it ought to be part of an agenda of national unity."

Last night's discussion inaugurated the Kennedy School's new Center for Health and Human Resources Policy, which was established this summer. Mary Jo Bane, the center's director and a professor of public policy, said that her priorities will include chronicling the progress of the movement "toward self-help and less toward a system forgiving out checks."

The panelists said they hoped to see a nationalversion of new programs in California,Massachusetts and New Jersey which stressmandatory training and education programs forwelfare recipients. Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan(D-N.Y.) and Rep. Thomas Downey (D-N.Y.) aresponsoring bills in Congress which incorporatethese state innovations.

"The mandate, the support is for incentives toextend a helping hand instead of a handout," saidCastle.

"If we can agree with the Soviets onintermediate-range missiles, then we can forge aconsensus on welfare reform," said Clinton, whoconsidered a run for the Democratic presidentialrace earlier this year.

The Kennedy School created the Health and HumanResources Center because its students and facultycomplained that there was no Harvard program tostudy issues of national poverty and their policyimplications, Bane said yesterday. "A lot ofstudents may have felt somehow that the schoolwasn't as interested in these issues as in themore sexy ones like defense and nationalsecurity," she said.

Bane said the center will hold aUniversity-wide seminar on child poverty thisspring, and that she is planning an executiveseminar on the same issue which would bring bothnational and state level government officials tothe center