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How to Apply for Welfare
Jason Davis and I decided to take on the task of filing for welfare, specifically cash and food assistance. In order to qualify for either of these, everyone in the household must be a citizen or at least allowed in the country as a permanent resident and have a social security number. Also, you need to show that you are either employed or are trying to be employed. Then, it all comes down to how much assistance you qualify for, which depends on your total income and how many dependents and disables are in the household. Welfare is only a temporary assistance, and before you are given any assistance you must fill out paperwork showing that you will work towards sustaining yourself after the welfare has run out. When trying to go through this task of learning about the process and making the flowchart, Jason and I focused on the paperwork at first. As soon as we realized that the paperwork doesn't actually explain anything clearly, I went digging into the website for Pennsylvania welfare and benefits. I found lists of the qualifications of the different types of welfare, and I went about connecting them. So, we finalized the flowchart and just finished up the paperwork.
If anything, the paperwork was pretty straightforward, but tedious. It was all the expected questions about your demographics and your income. But, the only way you could really fill out this paperwork is if you had all your information in front of you on your utilities, health issuance, and information on every person in your household you are applying for. However, the paper work did come with explanation pages that outline certain information (which is why there seemed to be SO MUCH paperwork). If I really wanted to apply for welfare, going through the process of getting all that information and making sure it was all accurate would have taken a lot of resources.
The most confusing part of this whole process is determining what kind of welfare you qualify for. Jason and I looked at the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families because our made-up person had a family with children. However, there is also General Assistance, and depending on how you stand with TANF and GA, you get certain benefits in food assistance (SNAP). If you don't qualify for TANF, you may qualify for GA. But, it doesn't make it exactly clear where the line is drawn. I figured out that the difference usually is that if the only reason you do not qualify for TANF is if you do not have any dependents or if it is because you are in certain circumstances where you cannot work (for a good reason), you could qualify for GA. It really isn't clear, so you would have to apply for both and just wait and see what you get. It was really frustrating. It needs to become more clear for people as to what they should actually apply for.
So what have these systems become so frustrating and complex? I'm almost certain people went a little crazy with the "What if?" game. Going through the original paperwork, they might have seen a certain part and thought "What if this person is in the situation?" Obviously that part needed to change so it fit the needs of everyone applying. However, the people never went back into the systems after the What If game was played to see if they could simplify or make the different paths more distinct and clear.
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How to get a Green Card: Flowchart
Along with Jeff Kessler, I chose the bureaucratic task of filing for a Green Card. There are various ways to get a Green Card – through family, through employment, as a refugee, and more. Each way has its own particular paperwork. Everything is made even more confusing when the person filing is currently outside the United States. Jeff and I filled out the paperwork required for getting a Green Card through a marriage, which was not particularly difficult. However, many of the other types of Green Card paperwork are not nearly as straightforward.
Jeff and I first made the flow chart, dividing up the various routes to a Green Card between the two of us. I worked on getting a Green Card through family members, which has, in itself, various sub-options. The paperwork had two parts, and so we split that up. I filled out the shorter post, and spent extra time making our flow chart colorful and well-formatted.
The system for getting a Green Card is convoluted at best. I think that this is because, as various situations arise, complexity is added from necessity – but no one ever takes the time to weed out the now-outdated complexities. Also, I think that there is a motivation to keep people from being able to easily gain access to the country. If I could, I would make the three main categories (family, employment, refugee) still separate, but within each have just a clearly defined process, instead of many sub-processes.
I enjoyed this process. I thought it was a valuable experience: waiting on line, figuring out paperwork, following link trails online to find steps are all things that I will certainly have to do as I interact with the government throughout my life. I also liked making the flow chart, because it was a cool, math-related challenge.
SCOTUS Case Blog: Setser vs. US
This case is about the interaction between government at the State level and at the Federal level. For this reason, it has to do with Article 4 and Amendment 10. Because it has to do with fairness of sentencing, it also is related to Amendment 7. Finally, the question is related to power in the judicial branch (the court system) and power in the executive branch (the prison system), and so it is a question of checks and balances.
The specific question is: If someone is charged with a state crime and a federal crime, and the state court has not yet determined a sentence, can the federal court order the federal sentence to be served consecutively to the not-yet-imposed state sentence?
Facts of the Case
In 2006, Monroe Setser, of Texas, was sentenced to five years of probation for possession of methamphetamine. A year later, he pleaded guilty to a federal charge of possession of 50 or more grams of methamphetamine, with intent to distribute. The crime was also an offense in the state of Texas, and so the federal court knew that Setser's possession charge could lead to a state sentence – not to mention to a revocation of his probation. Because of this, the federal court wanted to decide how all of those hypothetical sentences would interact. They decided that Setser's federal sentence would be served after any sentence that the state gave for the earlier possession crime, but at the same time as any sentence imposed for the 2007 possession-and-intent-to-sell crime.
The state court then sentenced Setser. For the 2006 crime, they revoked his parole and gave him five years in prison, and for the 2007 crime they gave him 10 years in prison. They ordered those two sentences to be served at the same time.
In 2010, he was paroled from the state crime and transferred to the federal prison system. The federal sentence was not shortened at all from time spent serving the state sentences.
Setser said that the court should not have the right to decide how his sentences were to be served, and so he appealed the federal sentence. The United States actually agrees with Setser, so the court appointed a man named Evan Young to argue the case against him.
Summary of the Arguments before the SCOTUS
Setser argued with that the prison system should have the right to decide how his sentences are to be served, and not the federal court. His argument is based on 18 U.S.C. §3584(a), a law which states that:
"If multiple terms of imprisonment are imposed on a defendant at the same time, or if a term of imprisonment is imposed on a defendant who is already subject to an undischarged term of imprisonment, the terms may run concurrently or consecutively… Multiple terms of imprisonment imposed at the same time run concurrently unless the court orders or the statute mandates that the terms are to run consecutively. Multiple terms of imprisonment imposed at different times run consecutively unless the court orders that the terms are to run concurrently."
His main argument is that, because his own circumstance does not fall under the specific cases outlined in the law, the judge of the federal court should not be able to decide how his sentences were to be served. Instead, he argues, the federal prison system should decide that matter at the end of his state term. He also states that, before that particular section was enacted, the Bureau of Prisons had the power to make sentences run at the same time – and so, since the statute does not apply to his particular case, the Bureau of Prisons should still have that right.
The counterargument is that the statute is a way of giving more power to courts, not specifying when they have power. In both of the situations outlined by the statute, the judge is allowed to decide whether to overwrite the default – so, even though Setser's particular case is not included in those situations, the judge should still be able to say how the sentences should be served.
Predictions on the outcome
The United States actually agrees with Setser. This makes me believe that the Supreme Court is likely to yield that the federal court did, indeed, make a mistake in specifying how Setser should serve his various sentences, even before the state sentences were decided.
SOURCE:
Michael Dimino, Argument preview: Court to consider run-on sentences, SCOTUSblog (Nov. 23, 2011, 3:00 PM), http://www.scotusblog.com/2011/11/argument-preview-court-to-consider-run-on-sentences/
International Adoption (via Hague Convention) Flow Chart
The task my partner and I selected was to complete an international adoption using the Hague Convention, which is the more strictly regulated process for adoption. To complete an adoption, we needed to first select the country we wanted our child from, and the adoption service that would direct us to the specific programs in the country. After this, a lot of paperwork ensued: forms 1-800 and 1-800-a and applications for Visas and passports. To complete the adoption, we needed to be "interviewed" by the consul of the country and only if they approve and issue our child's visa, could the adoption be complete.
Fortunately, the paperwork was straightforward, requiring similar information on every form such as our names, date of birth, current address and phone numbers. However, if we were to actually submit these papers, the difficulties would become evident through the restrictions for adoptive parents like the number of years they have been married or their ages. Each service requires something different and without approval for each step, a couple could potentially go through multiple adoptive services and countries before finally completing adoption.
The only thing I would change about this process is the redundant paperwork. As I said earlier, most of the forms required very similar information and to save time and space, the forms could be combined. This would allow the process to run faster and smoother. If this process were real, there would also be a lot of back and forth between the country and the couple that could be less chaotic if this turned into one big meeting where all of the child's information and the couple's information forms are exchanged at once. However, as far as bureaucratic processes go, this one is more straightforward than most. The only reason the process is slow and careful is because of what's on the line is this process goes wrong. If couples could easily walk into an adoption agency and pick a child, there would be a lot of unhappy children with poorly educated parents.