Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Social Welfare Law Commons™

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Fordham Law School

Discipline
Keyword
Publication Year
Publication
Publication Type

Articles 31 - 56 of 56

Full-Text Articles in Social Welfare Law

Beyond Economically Targeted Investments: Redefining The Legal Framework Of Pension Fund Investments In Low-To-Moderate Income Residential Real Estate, Alec Sauchik Jan 2001

Beyond Economically Targeted Investments: Redefining The Legal Framework Of Pension Fund Investments In Low-To-Moderate Income Residential Real Estate, Alec Sauchik

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This Note first presents the socioeconomic theory underlying the concept of ETIs and outlines the scope of trustees' fiduciary obligations to plan participants when making investments in residential real estate. It also analyzes relevant case law pertaining to fiduciary duties of pension fund trustees. Next, it compares two conflicting views on the legality of economically targeted investments. Finally, it argues that although the legal framework applicable to the fiduciary obligations of pension fund trustees is inadequate to fully address all challenges to the legality of ETIs, pension fund investments in low-to-moderate income residential real estate can be reconciled with the …

Go to article

Community Lawyering: Theory And Practice, Derek Denckla, Matthew Diller Jan 2000

Community Lawyering: Theory And Practice, Derek Denckla, Matthew Diller

Other Publications

Materials for So Goes A Nation: Lawyers and Communities

Go to article

Government Of The Good , Abner S. Greene Jan 2000

Government Of The Good , Abner S. Greene

Faculty Scholarship

Webster's definition of the noun "good" begins: "something that possesses desirable qualities, promotes success, welfare, or happiness, or is otherwise beneficial." Whether government should promote the good, and in particular whether government should use its powers of persuasion-its "speech," if you will-to promote contested views of the good, is the subject of this Article. I will argue that, as a matter of political theory, government in a liberal democracy not only may promote contested views of the good, but should do so, as well. Further, nothing in our constitutional jurisprudence demands otherwise, assuming certain conditions are met. In taking these …

Go to article

Civil Disturbances: Battles For Justice In New York City Jan 1999

Civil Disturbances: Battles For Justice In New York City

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This Collection contains a number of essays that are a part of Civil Disturbances, a collaborative project between artists and lawyers that commemorates various public interest law suits and social justice efforts in New York City. The project itself consists of twenty signs, each representing one specific case, that were designed to be both provoking and informative. This specific Collection contains printings of eight of the signs, as well as separate writings on issues and cases including: disabled people's accessibility to the Empire State Building, child welfare, children's rights, women and the FDNY, rights of the homeless, and welfare benefits. …

Go to article

Welfare Reform And Child Care: A Proposal For State Legislation, Clare Huntington Jan 1996

Welfare Reform And Child Care: A Proposal For State Legislation, Clare Huntington

Faculty Scholarship

The shortage of subsidized child care creates three problems. First, it contributes to underemployment because job options are greatly reduced when child care is unavailable. Second, it erodes the wages of parents who do work because low-income families spend a debilitating percentage of their earnings to pay for the care of their children. Third, it relegates many children to poor quality child care settings, compromising their academic potential and social well-being, and placing them at risk for delinquency and dependency. Part I of this article discusses the current paucity of quality, affordable child care, and the effects of this shortage. …

Go to article

From Welfare To Work In New York City Public Housing, Ruben Franco Jan 1995

From Welfare To Work In New York City Public Housing, Ruben Franco

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This Essay highlights the relationship between welfare and work in New York City's public housing. Part II discusses the composition of the Housing Authority's tenant body in past years as well as the political and social changes affecting the Housing Authority. Part III presents current Housing Authority ideas and programs that address moving tenants from welfare to work. Part IV outlines strategies employed by the Housing Authority to attract more working families, thereby improving the economic mix and social stability of the tenant population. Finally, this Essay concludes that while the Housing Authority cannot, and perhaps should not, address the …

Go to article

The Administration Of Public Assistance, James A. Krauskopf Jan 1995

The Administration Of Public Assistance, James A. Krauskopf

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This Essay discusses the problems of implementation and administration of proposed welfare reforms. It gives a brief historical background on such reforms, describes the nature of their administration, discusses current and proposed reforms and the public perceptions of them, and compares welfare to other government expenditures. It concludes by recommending that social services be integrated at the local rather than federal level.

Go to article

Disability And Welfare Reform: Keep The Supplemental Security Income Program But Reengineer The Disability Determination Process, Gay Gellhorn Jan 1995

Disability And Welfare Reform: Keep The Supplemental Security Income Program But Reengineer The Disability Determination Process, Gay Gellhorn

Fordham Urban Law Journal

The thesis of this Article is that reform of the Supplemental Security Income disability program is properly on the welfare reform agenda, but not in the terms cast by proposed legislation. Procedural reform targeting identified problems should be the first step, rather than the termination of the federal entitlement program or the re-writing of the eligibility criteria. Substantive reform should follow such procedural reform. Therefore, this Article will focus particularly on procedural reform, although it will place that discussion in the context of the current legislative climate. Part II of this Article describes the current disability determination process and why …

Go to article

The Failures Of Litigation As A Tool For The Development Of Social Welfare Policy, Susan V. Demers Jan 1995

The Failures Of Litigation As A Tool For The Development Of Social Welfare Policy, Susan V. Demers

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This article argues that litigation is largely counterproductive to the development of a coherent and feasible social welfare policy and interferes with the constitutionally-derived separation of powers. It describes the proper role of the courts when evaluating government actions and the proper procedures for doing so. It then discusses several cases brought against the New York State Department of Social Services and local governments, arguing that the courts have abandoned their appropriate role, and using these decisions to illustrate its thesis.

Go to article

Is There A Doctrine In The House? Welfare Reform And The Unconstitutional Conditions Doctrine, Jonathan Romberg Jan 1995

Is There A Doctrine In The House? Welfare Reform And The Unconstitutional Conditions Doctrine, Jonathan Romberg

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This Article proposes that courts should subject unconstitutional conditions cases to intermediate scrutiny rather than presuming that a conditioned benefit is either valid or invalid based on its formal attributes. In conducting intermediate scrutiny, courts should consider: (i) the degree of equality or neutrality demanded by the underlying constitutional right; (ii) the importance of the benefit to the recipient; (iii) the germaneness of the condition to the reason the government may legitimately deny the benefit in the absence of the condition, and thus whether the government is attempting to use its economic and regulatory powers to gain leverage over a …

Go to article

The Worst Of Times . . . And The Best Of Times: Lawyering For Poor Clients Today, Louise G. Trubek Jan 1995

The Worst Of Times . . . And The Best Of Times: Lawyering For Poor Clients Today, Louise G. Trubek

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This Essay describes three areas in which advocates have developed new models of practice and new forms of advocacy. It examines ways that lawyers and clients are collaborating to create more effective advocacy for battered women, low-income entrepreneurs and nonprofit community-based organizations that serve the poor. It describes how, why and where the new practices operate and analyzes the roots of the new approaches, showing that they can be traced to changes in lawyering theory and new visions of the lawyer-client relationship. The Essay assesses whether these models can be sustained and generalized, concluding that although the new approaches are …

Go to article

Changing Legal Contexts For Affirmative Welfare Reform, Melville D. Miller, Jr. Jan 1995

Changing Legal Contexts For Affirmative Welfare Reform, Melville D. Miller, Jr.

Fordham Urban Law Journal

To test whether the block grant approach currently under consideration in Congress actually achieves the goal of providing states with the flexibility necessary to effect meaningful policy changes, this Essay contrasts the way two different reform proposals would be treated in the current legal and regulatory environment to the way they would likely fare under the proposed legislation. One proposal used in this analysis is a comprehensive welfare reform program, self-described as "progressive," that was developed by a community-based, grass roots coalition in New Jersey. The New Jersey reform proposal aims to improve outcomes for recipients, rather than simply to …

Go to article

The Implications Of Current Welfare Reform Proposals For The Housing Assistance System, Sandra J. Newman Jan 1995

The Implications Of Current Welfare Reform Proposals For The Housing Assistance System, Sandra J. Newman

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This Essay assesses proposals to reform welfare from the perspective of effects on housing assistance. The focus is on the two welfare reform proposals that have received the most attention during late 1994 and early 1995: the Clinton Administration's Work and Responsibility Act (WRA and the Republican Party's Personal Responsibility Act (PRA). This analysis is limited to the provisions in each bill regarding time limits, eligibility restrictions, and work requirements for AFDC recipients, and estimates how the housing assistance system would be affected if these provisions were in effect today. This analysis focuses on two types of impacts: effects on …

Go to article

Introductory Remarks: Is The Issue Welfare Or Poverty?, Matthew Diller Jan 1995

Introductory Remarks: Is The Issue Welfare Or Poverty?, Matthew Diller

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This article introduces the Urban Welfare Reform symposium materials, giving a broad overview of areas of discussion and conflict. It focuses particularly on the disparity between the problem of welfare dependency debated in congress and the general problem of poverty noted by legal scholars. It concludes that the focus on welfare as a problem in and of itself is misdirected. It urges that focus be shifted to poverty in general, with welfare discussed as a solution rather than a problem in its own right.

Go to article

Urban Welfare Reform: A Community-Based Perspective, Margo D. Butts Jan 1995

Urban Welfare Reform: A Community-Based Perspective, Margo D. Butts

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This Essay advocates for community-based efforts to redeem the welfare system. It first discusses the causes of welfare dependency, and the adverse effects of current reform proposals. It then outlines goals for effective welfare reform, and describes the welfare reform program being implemented by the Bedford-Stuyvesant community. It concludes that effective welfare reform requires community initiated programs that focus on remedying factors leading to poverty, best identified and dealt with on a local level.

Go to article

Trying To Fit Square Pegs Into Round Holes: The Need For A New Funding Scheme For Kinship Caregivers, Randi Mandelbaum Jan 1995

Trying To Fit Square Pegs Into Round Holes: The Need For A New Funding Scheme For Kinship Caregivers, Randi Mandelbaum

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This article discusses the inadequacy of the current welfare system in meeting the needs of so-called "kinship caregivers." It summarizes the provisions of the two major programs for these individuals - the Aid to Families with Dependent Children fund, and the Adoption Assistance and Child Welfare Act. It explains the difficulty for kinship caregivers under these systems, and outlines a proposed legislative solution whereby individuals in nontraditional family structures could more easily qualify for welfare.

Go to article

Replace Welfare For Contingent Workers With Unemployment Compensation, Stephen Bingham Jan 1995

Replace Welfare For Contingent Workers With Unemployment Compensation, Stephen Bingham

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This essay examines the manner in which the current unemployment insurance system maintains poverty and increases dependence on public assistance programs. It examines the plight of the working poor, the inadequacy of unemployment compensation, and the failure of welfare to compensate for the weaknesses of the unemployment system. It then proposes reforms to the unemployment compensation system, and a new system for employable individuals without ties to the workforce, explaining why this proposal makes sense in light of the current unemployment situation.

Go to article

Protecting Women's Welfare In The Face Of Violence, Martha F. Davis, Susan J. Kraham Jan 1995

Protecting Women's Welfare In The Face Of Violence, Martha F. Davis, Susan J. Kraham

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This article argues that the Aid to Families With Dependent Children program provides a valuable means of continuing support for impoverished women. It points out that such women are at an increased risk of domestic violence, and that they are often unable to escape from abusive relationships because they and their children are economically dependent on their partners. The article criticizes proposed reforms to AFDC from this context, arguing that without the safety net provided by public assistance, many women and children would be trapped by financial constraints in dangerous or life threatening relationships. Thus, an adequate level of public …

Go to article

Race, Rat Bites And Unfit Mothers: How Media Discourse Informs Welfare Legislation Debate, Lucy A. Williams Jan 1995

Race, Rat Bites And Unfit Mothers: How Media Discourse Informs Welfare Legislation Debate, Lucy A. Williams

Fordham Urban Law Journal

The goal of this article is to expose and critique the media images of poor women that drive legislative debate in AFDC public policy issues. Part II discusses the media image and its centrality in shaping social perceptions of welfare. Part III explores the impact of media images on law-making by focusing on three statutory time periods: 1935, when the AFDC program was initially enacted as part of the Social Security Act; 1967, when the first mandatory work requirements were, added to the AFDC statute; and the present, when states are implementing widely divergent categorical eligibility requirements that restrict AFDC …

Go to article

The Threat Of The Wandering Poor: Welfare Parochialism And Its Impact On The Use Of Housing Mobility As An Anti-Poverty Strategy, Susan Bennett Jan 1995

The Threat Of The Wandering Poor: Welfare Parochialism And Its Impact On The Use Of Housing Mobility As An Anti-Poverty Strategy, Susan Bennett

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This Essay discusses how, if one accepts the premises of mobility-based anti-poverty strategies, the geographical parochialism and structural rigidity of the welfare system undermine mobility goals. The Essay also examines the possibility that current trends in housing policy will undercut anti-poverty goals.

Go to article

Note: Finger Imaging: A 21st Century Solution To Welfare Fraud At Our Fingertips, James J. Killerlane Iii Jan 1995

Note: Finger Imaging: A 21st Century Solution To Welfare Fraud At Our Fingertips, James J. Killerlane Iii

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This Note describes the finger imaging process and summarizes the current New York Social Services law regarding public assistance. It also outlines the current finger imaging bill before the New York State Legislature. Part III examines and considers the two major policy arguments against the implementation of the program. Part IV outlines the legal controversy regarding finger imaging and addresses each express concern as well as constitutional issues. Part V compares New York's finger imaging legislation with similar legislation already in place in California and argues that the New York program will be as effective as California's. In conclusion, this …

Go to article

The Homeless: Judicial Intervention On Behalf Of A Politically Powerless Group, Neil V. Mckittrick Jan 1988

The Homeless: Judicial Intervention On Behalf Of A Politically Powerless Group, Neil V. Mckittrick

Fordham Urban Law Journal

The "new" homeless are more diverse, encompassing more minorities, women, younger people, and more families. This Article argues first, that judicial intervention on behalf of the homeless is necessary and appropriate because the homeless constitute a politically powerless group and second, that comprehensive legislation, beyond that which has been enacted thus far, is necessary to address the causes of the problem.

Go to article

Homelessness In A Modern Urban Setting, Mark Malone Jan 1982

Homelessness In A Modern Urban Setting, Mark Malone

Fordham Urban Law Journal

Homelessness in urban settings is a problem in increasing numbers, typically as a result of mental instability or unemployment. New York State Legislature has attempted to deal with the homelessness problem, and is at the forefront of those jurisdictions which accord legal rights to homeless people through court decisions and legislation. This note examines the historic causes of homelessness, the purpose of vagrancy and loitering statutes, and why they have proven ineffective in dealing with the enormity of the homelessness problem. The Note concludes that further additions should be made to the New York State Social Services Laws on the …

Go to article

Note: The Federal False Claims Act: A Potential Deterrent To Medicaid Fraud And Abuse, Peter J. Sherman Jan 1977

Note: The Federal False Claims Act: A Potential Deterrent To Medicaid Fraud And Abuse, Peter J. Sherman

Fordham Urban Law Journal

A scandal that seems certain to occupy headline space during the foreseeable future is the abuse of the Medicare and Medicaid programs, under which state agencies provide medical assistance to the elderly, needy and disabled with largely-federal funding. Medicaid fraud and abuse wastes an estimated three billion dollars of tax money each year. Senate investigators who studied the problem found that "rampant fraud and abuse exists among practitioners participating in the Medicaid program" and among participating medical testing laboratories. The Federal False Claims Act (FCA), a statute more than a century old, provides a potential deterrent to such fraud and …

Go to article

Welfare Law-Afdc-Agency-Caused Overpayments May Be Recouped By Reducing Grants Of Recipients Who Have "Disregarded" Income Available To Meet Their Standard Of Need, Keith E. Danish Jan 1976

Welfare Law-Afdc-Agency-Caused Overpayments May Be Recouped By Reducing Grants Of Recipients Who Have "Disregarded" Income Available To Meet Their Standard Of Need, Keith E. Danish

Fordham Urban Law Journal

The Agency attempted to recoup the overpayments of a woman and her nine dependent children by reducing the family's AFDC grant, in accordance with a state regulation which authorized such recoupment where the welfare recipient had current income available in excess of the AFDC grant. The Federal District Court for the Southern District of New York held that the challenged recoupment policy did not violate the Social Security Act. The current heightened awareness that there are limits to state resources has resulted in the tightening and curtailment of welfare programs. Welfare agencies must make greater efforts to decrease errors which …

Go to article

Note: The Eligibility Of The Unborn Child Under Afdc, John K. Enright Jan 1974

Note: The Eligibility Of The Unborn Child Under Afdc, John K. Enright

Fordham Urban Law Journal

This Note surveys recent litigation challenging the state denial of AFDC payments to pregnant women seeking benefit on behalf of their unborn children. Such decisions have focused on the issue of whether unborn children come within the definition of "dependent child" as set forth in Section 606 of the AFDC. Thus far, fourteen of seventeen reported decisions have included unborn children within the statutory definition. The Note concludes that the unborn child cases illustrate the difficulty of the rule that the Supreme Court laid out in Townsend v. Swank, which held that states must make AFDC payments to all eligible …

Go to article

First Prev