BY B.G. GREGG
The Cincinnati Enquirer
On June 1, the way Hamilton County delivers welfare services will change, just as welfare - as Americans once knew it - is changing.
The goal: Keep people from ever starting on welfare, saving taxpayers money.
The county's Department of Human Services will both break into neighborhood operations and form a public/private partnership with five local non-profits - the FreeStore/FoodBank, Talbert House, Beech Acres, Lighthouse and Cincinnati Works.
The partnership - which has drawn fire from social agencies not included - will act as a referral service for other social service agencies and will create a private pot of money to be tapped by people needing temporary help.
''Now, all we try to do is find out what assistance (people) are eligible for,'' said Lora Jollis, the department's welfare reform executive. ''In the new vision, they're going to come through the door, and we're going to identify partial income streams to keep them off public assistance.''
In June, the county will create two ''strategic business units,'' which will team about 150 workers from the agency's separate divisions to work with specific neighborhoods or geographic areas.
One of the units will focus on cases from East, Lower and West Price Hill, Sedamsville-Riverside, South Fairmount and Westwood. The other will focus on Corryville, Mount Auburn, Over-the-Rhine, Riverfront and the West End.
The county expects there will be about 10 such units in the next several years.
Ms. Jollis said the change will allow better communication among the agency's divisions.
The streamlined system is a common-sense approach that should have been in place long before now, human services officials admit. Their department has traditionally been divided into separate divisions, with workers rarely interacting, although many clients had cases in several divisions.
Beech Acres, Talbert House, the FreeStore/FoodBank, Lighthouse Youth Services and Cincinnati Works will work with the first strategic business units. The private agencies are calling their collaboration Accountability and Credibility Together (ACT).
The five agencies are contributing $10,000 each for emergency services.
The pool of money will be important when it comes to assisting certain people, Ms. Jollis said.
''If a man has his tools stolen out of the back of the truck, and he needs those tools to work, and if he gets tools he can avoid going on welfare, why not buy him the tools?'' she said.
Because the county cannot pay for those tools with federal or state money, it will rely on private agencies to do so.
The private agencies hope that, after a few months of showing the partnership can work, the human services department will sign contracts to reimburse them for the money they spend.
Also, money saved by keeping people off welfare could likely be spent on other social services, many provided by the ACT agencies, said Neil Tilow, executive director of Talbert House.
''We're not in this to make a profit,'' Mr. Tilow said. ''... We're trying to set up more a way of doing business than a business.''
But leaders of other private agencies that contract with the human services department are worried they might be shut out. Several have requested meetings with Don Thomas, director of the county's Department of Human Services.
''We provide major services to women on public assistance,'' said Charlene Ventura, executive director of the YWCA in Cincinnati. ''... We just want clarification of how this is going to work and how we can become part of the concept.''
Carol Burrus, ACT project manager, said ACT is an effort to bring social agencies together. She said she hopes ACT can get everyone focused on keeping people off welfare.
''Everyone is panicked that we're going to take everything over,'' she said. ''We are just doing this because we are the largest agencies, and we have the political clout.''
Mr. Thomas said his agency will continue to fulfill the dozens of contracts it has with social-service agencies throughout the county. He said that ACT is working only with the first two strategic business units, and that other agencies, too, can come up with creative responses to welfare reform.
''We're working with these agencies because they all agreed to bring their own money to the table,'' he said. ''We'll work with anybody who wants to bring their money to the table.''
