Dear Senator Brown and Senator Vance,
Advocates for Ohio’s Future (AOF) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan coalition of over 500 state and local health and human services policy, advocacy and provider organizations that strive to strengthen families and communities through public funding for health, human services, and early care & education. We work to empower and support nonprofit organizations and the health and human services workforce in the critical work they do, especially as it relates to lifting up and caring for all Ohioans.
As a coalition of a broad range of health and human service organizations, we unite to identify and prioritize the greatest needs of people and families across the state. Though we’d like to think the challenges of the public health and economic crises are far behind us, the impacts are still being felt across our state. Today, hundreds of thousands of children, adults, and families struggle to afford food, rent, utilities, and other basic necessities. Currently, Ohio’s hunger relief network provides take-home groceries, meals, and personal care items to 1 million Ohioans each month, 1 in 4 Ohio renter households spend more than half their income on rent and utilities, 30 percent of Ohioans are enrolled in Medicaid and nearly 17 percent of Ohio’s children live in poverty.
AOF is also concerned that thousands of Ohioans who are already struggling to make ends meet will lose resources to keep food on the table and lose healthcare coverage as COVID era flexibilities and enhanced supports unwind.
In Ohio’s state biennial budget debates, our coalition is currently fighting to help older adults keep food on the table by supplementing SNAP benefits, improving the SNAP Employment & Training (E&T) program and restoring the employment incentive programs for critical jobs administered by counties to help address the benefit cliff and fill gaps between programs. We are also fighting to ensure workers in crucial and growing industries like direct care workers, behavioral health care workers and childcare workers are paid fair wages that not only reflect the importance of their work, but also allow them to provide for themselves and their families without the help of public assistance.
Most of all we want to help all Ohioans and families in times of crisis, ensure their basic needs are met to help them stabilize, then support their path to self-sufficiency with resources, guidance and opportunity.
We were discouraged to hear that potential solutions to decrease the federal debt have included discussions around imposing “tougher aid programs” including new work requirements for public programs like SNAP, cash assistance (Ohio Works First, OWF) and Medicaid.
Most people receiving food, health, and income assistance are working or between jobs – and if they aren’t, they are in school, have serious disabilities or health conditions, or have caregiving responsibilities. These proposals will cause many working people to lose assistance because of things beyond their control like red tape or the nature of low-wage work, which has fluctuating hours and does not offer paid leave.
According to Ohio Department of Medicaid Director Maureen Corcoran, “In the 2021 Ohio Medicaid Assessment Survey (OMAS), 41.6% of the Medicaid population ages 19-64 were working. These workers were more likely to have been at their job for a shorter duration than higher income workers, suggesting elevated levels of job insecurity among low-income workers, particularly if there is an economic slowdown…In 2020, 52.9% of American workers with private insurance had a high-deductible health plan (HDHP). This is significantly higher than in 2015, when that percentage was 39.4%. HDHPs allow workers to pay less in advance on their premiums for a health insurance product they may not use, giving them more control over their healthcare spending. However, while they may be useful tools for individuals who are higher income and overall healthier, they are often more expensive and burdensome for less healthy workers with lower incomes.”
We urge you to protect the most vulnerable people in our society—workers earning low wages, families with children, older adults and disabled Americans—from threats that reduce SNAP and OWF benefits and risk Medicaid coverage resulting in worsening health outcomes, higher health care costs, increased housing instability and homelessness and rising rates of hunger.
Instead, AOF—with its depth and breadth of its membership and partners—stands ready to assist you and your office in fighting for policies that support work and help people thrive: more affordable child and family care, paid sick leave, and high-quality job training. We ask that you elevate our state’s greatest resource—our people—in federal budget negotiations and support public programs that provide economic security, help people get to work, support a strong recovery, and empower Ohio residents.
Sincerely,
Advocates for Ohio’s Future