Bill requiring drug testing of welfare recipients passes House

[drmom777]

I always feel kind of nauseous when one of these threads pops up here. I have never even tried recreational drugs ( goody two shoes, I know) I have worked as hard as I could every day of my life. I have also had to accept food stamps and heating and electric assistance. Not now, but recently enough.

The whole experience was thoroughly humiliating, not because I was in the position to need help, I knew that we were doing the best we could under difficult circumstances, but because the system is set up to be humiliating.

I think having to pee in cup in order to get desperately needed assistance would have made this just that much worse. Do you people have any idea how those who need assistance are treated by people who work in the system? It is quite difficult to mainain hope and strength as it is.

 

[jess2416]

I think having to pee in cup in order to get desperately needed assistance would have made this just that much worse. Do you people have any idea how those who need assistance are treated by people who work in the system? It is quite difficult to mainain hope and strength as it is.

:hail::hail:

 

[NicoleLJ]

I think having to pee in cup in order to get desperately needed assistance would have made this just that much worse. Do you people have any idea how those who need assistance are treated by people who work in the system? It is quite difficult to mainain hope and strength as it is.

:hail::hail::hail:

 

[Saeleofu]

I just have to say, honestly I don't find a drug test to be humiliating, at all. I've had to take plenty of them for jobs. Heck when I started work for USPS they lined us all up and did the test right in front of us, no big deal. I know it's going to be negative, so I have nothing to worry about.

 

[NicoleLJ]

Here's the court brief on the case that lead to Judge Roberts declaring Michigan's welfare drug testing unconstitutional. A friend on another forum provided it. I think it covers most of the points against the policy:

http://www.aclu.org/files/FilesPDFs/marchwinski_brief.pdf

 

[GipsyQueen]

Nope, I don't think its correct. If you start testing for drugs, you have to start testing for alcohol miss use and smokers in general.
I see so many people on welfare, who claim they can't afford to feed themselves and their childern from the 452€ (I think its 350€ per child) they get a month from the state, but smoking like idiots. They get their rent payed, their electric bill, their heat. But then they can't feed themselves for 452€ a month? Thats crap. I live off less most months, after rent is payed, my electrical bill is payed, my phone bill ect. Somehow though, I manage.
Of course it pisses me off, when people use state money - my tax money - for drugs, alcohol and ciggerettes, but that is their choice. A smoker won't stop smoking because they don't recive money, a drug addict will just go to different methods as will a alcohol addict.

 

[blue]

Isnt this racist? After all more minorities are on the welfare then the white devils?
Checking Sarcasm Meters.

 

[Lilavati]

I just have to say, honestly I don't find a drug test to be humiliating, at all. I've had to take plenty of them for jobs. Heck when I started work for USPS they lined us all up and did the test right in front of us, no big deal. I know it's going to be negative, so I have nothing to worry about.

You don't find it humiliating. Great. Many of the rest of us do find it so. I find it humiliating to be forced to give a bodily fluid to someone who isn't a doctor. I also find it degrading to be treated like a drug addict, when there is NO EVIDENCE whatsoever that that is the case. And yes, when I took a drug test, I knew I would pass, because I wasn't using drugs. Not to mention the way I was treated at the testing center.

I'll also point out that no one would DREAM of asking me, at this moment, as a private lawyer, to take a drug test. (I think the gov't does test its attorneys, once, when they hire you, I've been told, thanks to an idiotic law that requires it of all Federal employees) If someone asked us, most of the attorneys would probably walk. And yet being actively on drugs would, in fact, effect my performance, and in ways that are difficult to detect. And believe me, they invested A LOT of money in me.

Drug tests that aren't about safety, that they claim are to "protect their investment", are about power, class, and frankly, the fact that they can freaking get away with it.

 

[Gempress]

Most jobs require drug testing now . . . .

This.

 

[Gempress]

Nope, I don't think its correct. If you start testing for drugs, you have to start testing for alcohol miss use and smokers in general.

Drugs are illegal. Alcohol and tobacco aren't. Big difference in my book.

 

[Locke]

Drugs are illegal. Alcohol and tobacco aren't. Big difference in my book.

So you are okay with the bill passing because it "prevents" illegal drug use?

I've experienced how alcohol can destroy peoples' lives, careers and families. I know people who have spent HUNDREDS of dollars on cigarettes a month. Just because a substance illegal, does not make its effects any worse than legal substances.

 

[Dekka]

Drugs are illegal. Alcohol and tobacco aren't. Big difference in my book.

But that is really irrelevant in this discussion.

If one is saying they are doing more than paying for necessities cigarettes and alchohol cost just as much if not more.

If one is saying its ok to test for job altering substances then alcohol should be there too.

If one is saying that its to fix the system as too many drug addicts are scamming the system and the poor tax payer shouldn't support them... well all other current methods are far more expensive.

so legal or not makes no difference. The War on Drugs is a lot like the TSA pat downs, a big show to demonstrate the bureaucracies doing 'something' yet almost entirely ineffective at trying to solve the problem. No one wants to help people with these sorts of problems, and I never understand why (I get it if you have helped and helped etc and there is never any progress.. but most people never want to help the first time when it comes to drug addicts)

 

[sparks19]

I say they should just stop handing out cash all together. give vouchers for housing and bills. All things that require cash... well they'll have to come up with the cash on their own somehow. Then if they choose to try to "sell" the vouchers or something they don't get their bill paid and they lose their electricity or whatever bill it was. Then at least it won't be our cash thats BUYING their drugs to support their habits.

 

[~Jessie~]

I say they should just stop handing out cash all together. give vouchers for housing and bills. All things that require cash... well they'll have to come up with the cash on their own somehow. Then if they choose to try to "sell" the vouchers or something they don't get their bill paid and they lose their electricity or whatever bill it was. Then at least it won't be our cash thats BUYING their drugs to support their habits.

I think this would be a great idea!

 

[sparks19]

Now I' m not entirely sure on how to put it into practice lol but that's not my job to figure out haha. seriously I can't imagine it would be more difficult or time consuming than doing just drug testing

 

[~Jessie~]

Now I' m not entirely sure on how to put it into practice lol but that's not my job to figure out haha. seriously I can't imagine it would be more difficult or time consuming than doing just drug testing

I told Ian about this thread last night and we were talking about this. lol. Get rid of the cash, and do everything as cards/vouchers. That will ensure that their children will at least have a place to live if they have to use a voucher for rent.

 

[Taqroy]

Good to know that you feal I need to be fired from my job. I've failed a drug test. TWICE. One for work and one for school. These tests are so unreliable it isn't even funny.

Where are the statistics saying that drug tests are unreliable? I've taken no less than four of them and none of them have come back as a false positive. If you failed twice then there was probably something else causing you to fail - in the US you can challenge and retake, I don't know how it is in Canada. And for the record I never found it to be degrading or humiliating - these days you do have to take a drug test for most jobs. Obviously other people feel differently and that's ok.

You can tell with threads like this who has actually had to struggle in their life and who hasn't.

Bull. You have no idea what people in this thread have gone through. I've never been on government assistance - I've never had to and I'm aware that I'm lucky I found a job right out of college and I have a fantastic family that will support me no matter what. But I also take responsibility for my actions and I budget very carefully to (hopefully) keep from ever having to go on assistance. I don't think everyone on welfare is a drug addict, nor do I think that everyone on welfare is lazy and "just isn't trying hard enough". I do think there are enough leeches sucking it dry that the people who ACTUALLY NEED IT are being overshadowed.

Something needs to be done to revamp the system. I don't know if drug tests are it but I don't think they hurt either.

 

[NicoleLJ]

Here is the end result of Michigan trying to pass blanket drug testing of all Welfare recipients.

Settlement Reached in ACLU of Michigan Lawsuit Over Mandatory Drug Testing of Welfare Recipients | American Civil Liberties Union

"Settlement Reached in ACLU of Michigan Lawsuit Over Mandatory Drug Testing of Welfare Recipients

DETROIT - Michigan's attempt to impose mandatory drug tests on all welfare recipients has finally come to an end, the American Civil Liberties Union announced today after a settlement was reached with the Family Independence Agency (FIA). The FIA can now require drug testing of welfare recipients only where there is a reasonable suspicion that the recipient is using drugs.

""We're very pleased that State the now recognizes that being poor is not a crime,"" said Kary Moss, Executive Director of the Michigan ACLU and an attorney in the case. ""Low-income parents can be assured that they won't have to choose between providing for their children and relinquishing their privacy rights.""

The settlement ends a seven-year battle that began in the Michigan Legislature in 1997. The ACLU filed the class-action lawsuit in September 1999 on behalf of all Michigan welfare recipients who would be denied income support and other benefits for other children if they refused to submit to random drug testing or failed to comply with a mandatory "substance abuse treatment plan."

""This settlement should send a message to the rest of the nation that drug testing programs like these are neither an appropriate nor effective use of a state's limited resources,"" said Graham Boyd, director of the National ACLU Drug Policy Litigation Project, who argued the case in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.

In April 2000, U.S. District Court Judge Victoria Roberts issued a preliminary injunction against enforcement of the law. She wrote that drug testing an entire class of citizens simply because they are poor ""would be dangerously at odds with the tenets of our democracy."" In April 2003, the appeals court affirmed that decision.

Before the ACLU filed its lawsuit, Michigan was the only state in the country that required all welfare applicants to submit to drug testing without suspicion of drug use.

In the five weeks that the program was in effect, the drug tests were positive in only eight percent of the cases, a percentage that is consistent with drug use in the general population. Of 268 people tested, only 21 tested positive for drugs and all but three were for marijuana.

In addition to Moss and Boyd, other attorneys who litigated the case for the ACLU were Robert Sedler, Cameron Getto, David Getto and Michael J. Steinberg."

For me this is a step in the right direction. They have to show just cause to test. To me this is totally different then blanket testing everyone.

 

[Giny]

Oh Tania, that would be a great idea!

I nominate Sparks for our next president!

 

[sparks19]

Oh Tania, that would be a great idea!

I nominate Sparks for our next president!

LOL no way... that is a job I do NOT want to take on lol :rofl1: