EXTENSION OF INDOCHINA REFUGEE ASSISTANCE PROGRAM TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 27, 1977 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION, CITIZENSHIP, AND INTERNATIONAL LAW, OF THE COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY, Washington, D.C. The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 9:45 a.m., in room B-352, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Joshua Eilberg [chairman of the subcommittee] presiding. Present: Representatives Eilberg, Hall, Fish, and Sawyer. Also present: Garner J. Cline and Arthur P. Endres, Jr., counsel; Mark R. Zecca, assistant counsel; and Joseph Wolfe, associate counsel. Mr. EILBERG. The subcommittee will come to order. Today's hearing is a continuation of this subcommittee's consideration of various proposals to extend the Indochina refugee assistance program. Last week we heard from various executive branch officials who testified in support of the administration's bill which was just recently submitted to the Congress. I might say that there were many questions that members of this subcommittee had of the administration, which responses have not as yet been received, and I do hope that we are able to move on this bill quickly because time indeed is running out. I deeply regret the fact that it has been submitted at such a late date but nevertheless I am hopeful that we will be able to give careful consideration to both the administration bill and the other bills that have been introduced. Today we will hear from various witnesses who will present a somewhat different view on the administration's proposal, as well as discuss some of the provisions contained in previous proposals on this subject. Our first witness this morning will be Congressman Stark who has introduced his own bill to extend the program, along with numerous cosponsors. I would like to welcome you to the subcommittee and look forward to hearing your testimony in support of your legislation. TESTIMONY OF HON. FORTNEY H. STARK, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA; ACCOMPANIED BY NEIL SIMON, LEGISLATIVE ASSISTANT Mr. STARK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to ask permission to have my prepared remarks made part of the record and to depart from them a little bit and summarize. If you care to, I invite you or your staff to interrupt at any point, which may shorten the proceedings for you. Mr. EILBERG. Without objection, your statement will be made part of the record. [Prepared statement of Hon. Fortney H. Stark follows:] STATEMENT OF HON. FORTNEY H. STArk, Jr. Mr. Chairman, and members of the subcommittee, thank you for providing me with this opportunity to testify on legislation to extend the Indochinese Refugee Assistance Program. This has been a matter of utmost concern to me, and I have introduced several pieces of legislation, most recently H.R. 9110, extending IRAP. These bills now have over 50 co-sponsors. While I am pleased that the Administration is now supporting a 3-year extension of this program, I take strong exception to its limitations, especially as they regard social services funding and an immediate reduction of reimbursements to states for general assistance programs. Let me explain. Although over 86 percent of the 145,000 Vietnamese refugees living in the U.S. were employed last year, nearly 35 percent were receiving some sort of cash assistance. In California, up to 46 percent were receiving cash assistance. Specially, 95 percent of the refugee males worked; 86 percent of the female refugees worked. What these figures prove is not only that most refugees made the effort to learn the language and secure a job in a foreign country, in spite of remarkable barriers facing them, but also that the greatest problem now facing the refugees in becoming self-sufficient is not unemployment, but underemployment. The most important element of the current IRAP program to assist refugees consists of social services and training projects. I believe that this should be the focus of any IRAP extension. Yet, under the ill-conceived Administration bill, no social services programs would be funded, and all 63 special Indochinese Training and Employment programs around the country, which provide language and vocational skill training, career counseling, and job placement services, would have to shut down. Only through these programs will the unskilled or language-handicapped refugees gain full access to the job market. While cash and medical assistance are absolutely essential for the short run, we must, in the long run, tie them to language and/or vocational training which lead to greater employment opportunity. Without these programs, which the Administration proposes to terminate, the legislation becomes nothing more than a welfare program, threatening to institutionalize dependency. The Administration claims that refugees who continue to need special assistance can be served through regular Federal programs such as CETA and Title XX of the Social Security Act. In fact, however, these programs cannot possibly be effective in reducing the dependency of refugees on cash assistance. Nearly all Title XX service agencies are already spending all of their available funds, and CETA programs have proved too inflexible and of little use in the resettlement effort. Moreover, many social insurance programs are simply not available to refugees due to existing regulations, or a lack of sufficient work records to meet eligibility requirements. In the final analysis, the Administration bill contains nothing that will enable the refugees to become fully self-supporting. Additionally, the Administration's bill is drafted so as to preclude the possibility of all but 17 states to provide cash assistance to refugees not eligible for AFDC. Since under their proposal, reimbursement to states for cash aid would immediately decrease to 75 percent, only the 17 states with statewide general assistance programs would be able to authorize funds to make up the remaining share. Other states, lacking statutory authority to spend funds for general assistance, would be unable to operate such programs. As a result, states such as California, which do have general assistance programs, would be inundated by an in-migration of refugees from other states-thereby increasing the local burden in these areas. I also want to emphasize the need to continue 100 percent funding for cash and medical assistance during fiscal year 1978. The sudden reduction of the Federal share to 75 percent would create havoc among the states, and effectively cripple the program. Only by providing 100 percent funding this year will states be able to plan for an orderly phase-down of the program. Regrettably, under the Administration's bill, phase-down of IRAP would be accomplished at the cost not only of the refugees, but of the state and local governments involved. I urge the members of this Subcommittee to support these changes. It is vital to continue social services funding so that the refugees can be truly served and truly have a chance to integrate into American society, and to continue 100 percent funding for one more year so that state and local governments do not have to suffer a financial hardship which should be a national responsibility. Only if these changes are made, can we have a responsible, humane, and costeffective extension of IRAP. Mr. STARK. I would also like to commend you as chairman of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship and International Law for bearing the brunt, of some politically unpopular issues. All too often you or your committee members receive criticism for programs that have fallen in your lap; and I think you have done an excellent job. I think you and your staff have been most patient and understanding, and I hope that we won't try that patience too far in dealing with this final problem. Mr. EILBERG. I might interrupt by saying, once again, as I said in my opening remarks we know what we have to do. We know the problems that come to us; but we need the cooperation of not only our colleagues in Congress but also of the administration, and I think that it is deplorable that just 2 weeks ago we got this legislation, with the program about to run out on September 30. I say it is outrageous. Mr. STARK. I share the chairman's concern and frustration. Of the 145,000 Vietnamese refugees, a preponderance of them, averaging 95 percent of the men and 86 percent of the women, are employed. There is among this group a remarkably high work ethic Secretary Califano has now introduced before the committee on which I serve, the House Committee on Ways and Means, a Welfare Reform Act. It stresses the fact that we have to create incentives to work and that we have to provide training. Those on welfare, both the unemployed and underemployed are not working out of choice; they are not working because they cannot find jobs or they don't have the training to rise above the most minimal kind of jobs. With the Indochinese refugees we have a group of people who are overcoming the most horrendous odds. They were functionally illiterate when they arrived, without friends, relatives. With our help, most have now found a place to live and jobs. Unless we provide them with social services, however, we can almost guarantee that many will become perennial, perpetual recipients of cash welfare. We can't let this happen. The refugees are a healthy, active people who have the greatest urge to become American citizens and participate in our society. Clearly, they do not want to be dependent on Federal handouts. Most of them are working people whom we classify as working poor. They are receiving public assistance only to supplement whatever salaries and wages they are able to earn. Continued language and vocational training will enable them to rise in the job market and become more sophisticated in the types of jobs they are able to perform. In this way, the refugees will become the kind of productive citizen who pays taxes, and an earning asset to our economy rather than a perpetual drain. I cannot emphasize too much this need for social services. In my opinion, it is a question of whether we shall be foresighted or myopic, thereby locking these people into a life of the most menial kind of jobs and guaranteeing a very slow assimilation into a society with language and culture and customs far different from that which they left. In sum, we have a State problem that was created by the Federal Government. We have a group of people who more than anything want to participate in what is universally accepted as the American way. We are attempting to give them not that that they need less while denying that which they need most, social services. In addition, by not continuing the fiscal year 1978, 100-percent funding to the States, our estimate is that only 17 States would be able to make the necessary adjustments to give any kind of assistance to these people in that year. So, it is also essential for us to keep the 100-percent level of funding in 1978 to give the States a year to adjust. Only then could a phaseout be effective. I recognize that this would cost about $119.1 million in fiscal year 1978 and that the second budget resolution included only $72 million. We would have to try for a budget waiver, but I think if your subcommittee, and subsequently your full committee, would support this concept, that we would have broad bipartisan support, and could then go to the Budget Committee to ask for a waiver on this point. I certainly would pledge to work with the chairman and his colleagues in this effort. I thank you for giving me the time to make these remarks. Can you explain why, after over 2 years of providing forms of assistance to refugees which are unavailable to needy nonrefugees, that is, those legally here, that is to say, citizens or permanent resident aliens, that you propose to continue preferential treatment for refugees? For example, for Indochinese refugees, some of the eligibility requirements for AFDC have been waived. After over 2 years in this country, would your bill continue to permit AFDC benefits for a single person with no children, when such benefits are denied to a nonrefugee applicant for AFDC? Mr. STARK. Yes; it would. These people came here without the history needed in some areas to qualify for AFDC. Indeed the minute they arrived in our country they were poor and unemployed. They are all of the things that many of our other AFDC recipients did not become in 1 day. It seems to us that this is a necessary waiver. Mr. EILBERG. I understand. Let me try another point along the same line. You stated, properly, that refugees in States which have no general assistance programs will be cut off from benefits if the Indochinese Refugee Assistance Act is terminated or phased down, as the administration proposes. To what extent are nonrefugees who live in those same States and who require assistance in the same predicament? Mr. STARK. My reason for stating that is that if the States get 75 percent the first year, they wouldn't have time to go through their own authorization-appropriation process to fill that gap in a year. Mr. EILBERG. But my point is that those who are not refugees suffer those disadvantages. Mr. STARK. But they do not have the same barriers to overcome. Mr. EILBERG. You said that in all but 17 States there were no programs? Mr. STARK. NO. What I said is, if the funding is not continued at the 100-percent level in the first year, fiscal year 1978, and if we cut back to 75 percent, all but 17 States would be unable to react quickly enough to makeup that difference. This would cripple the program. But, in fact, many of them are in programs that would continue. In California, for instance, we have a State supplemental income. That will go on regardless. Mr. EILBERG. Is that true of all of the other 33 States? I question that and that is really the question I am asking you. Mr. STARK. I really can't speak to all 33, but the States involved do see this refugee program as an additional burden on top of their average or standard public assistance load which they should not be expected to bear. Mr. EILBERG. We agree that if there are people who do not qualify for AFDC and who are citizens, or who are permanent resident aliens, in a State where there is no general assistance program, that they have no benefits, there is no State program, for those people. They suffer disadvantages, and there is real cause for these nonrefugees to resent what they get compared with what we are providing for refugees. Mr. STARK. I think that all people understand the special circumstances surrounding the Indochinese refugees in this country. Mr. EILBERG. But in so many cases where there is a program, the State program does not provide the full benefits that the refugee has received and would be receiving under our program. Mr. STARK. Well, that certainly wouldn't be the case in California. In other words, I view this as an incremental, additional load that was placed on the States. Mr. EILBERG. Perhaps it is not a fair question of you. We may ask it of another witness. For over 2 years the States have received full funding under the Indochinese Refugee Assistance Act. If we continue full funding for 1 more year, as you propose, why then should it be necessary for us to "wean" the States away from the Federal trough at reduced rates in the following 2 fiscal years? Why will the States not be able to assume full responsibility after fiscal 1978? Mr. STARK. I do not believe it is a question of "weaning" States away from the Federal trough but of finding that the people we are attempting to assist will, through hard work, diligence and with the help of language training and vocational training, become more selfsufficient thereby lessening the need for public assistance as people. learn and get higher skill levels and higher paying jobs they will leave |