Johanssis Peralta – Testimony

Community Voices Heard

Meeting with Commissioner Hansell

September 11, 2008

Good afternoon, my name is Johannsis Peralta and I am a member of Community Voices Heard. I am here to talk about how the state needs to help people like me get a good job to get off public assistance.

I am a resident of Beacon for the past 8 years. I am a single mother of a 7 year old daughter. I am currently unemployed and I have been out of work for one year. I am receiving public assistance - $238 per month.

Since I started getting public assistance, I have been looking for a job through every program I can find. I have talked to my case worker and I have been to the Department of Labor. At DSS, all they did was force me to do a “job search” - I had to get twenty employers a week to sign saying I went there looking for a job. This is hard because I do not have access to a computer, and always have my daughter with me.

All they would do for me is provide bus passes to do the job search, and once in a while, print out job postings and give it to me. I would look around the office and see lots of brochures about different job opportunities but they would never help explain any of them to me. Finally I requested that my caseworker send me to a computer skills training so I could do the job search better and get some skills. The class the sent me to was so basic I didn't learn anything - all they taught me was how to work the mouse and how to type an address.

They want you to get any job at all, but I don't want a job that pays too little and has no future. I worked at Taco Bell for a month and a half but they were giving me about 6 hours a week and wanted me to be available all the time. It was not worth my time to spend for the gas and babysitter and it was going nowhere. It is hard to look for a job and work at a low-paying job without child care for my daughter. I was told at DSS that I qualify for child care and I set it all up but DSS never paid my child care provider.

Right now I am doing a “Work Experience” assignment in Poughkeepsie at L & S Computer Tutors. I take training in the morning through VESID, and I work there in the afternoon. I am glad that I finally am getting some training, but I am not happy with the fact that I work for free.

Recently my rent went up in the development where I live – it is now more than my entire assistance grant. I am having a really hard time – my phone got shut off, and I am not able to afford anything. Now my daughter is at child care during the day, and I am out “working” all day, yet I am not bringing home a paycheck. “Work experience” still isn’t real work, and it isn’t the same as putting a real job on a resume. The “work experience” assignment is not going to help me get another job or get off public assistance.

I feel like I am trapped in a mess that seems like it will never end. The caseworkers make me feel like it is my fault that I have not been able to get a job. But I have come to the conclusion that the system is not trying to help me at all. The services that I need are just not there.

I don’t think it’s right for me, or anyone else, to have to work and not get a paycheck while we are struggling to pay our rent and feed our kids. The thing I need most right now is a decent paying job, and if the state were to create a Transitional Jobs Program, I could get a good paying job, and training, and the experience to get a permanent job and get off public assistance.