Large means-tested programs in particular, are governed by rigidly applied rules and requlations.   They lack flexibility. This means that some people end up taking advantage, and some people fall through the cracks. Given the need to be accountable, and the need to do as much as possible to assure equity and equality, this is a necessary evil of means-tested programs. History has proven that without these rules and requlations, which are closely monitored, too many people get denied services and benefits because of minority characteristics, or because their case worker doesn't like them, or people get services or benefits who are not eligible because of favoritism or political expediency. Big programs paint with a broad brush. Big programs address issues of social welfare on a broad, societal, aggregate scale. They do not have the capacity to deal with the nuances of individual situations.

That is one reason why we need a national health care plan that is comprehensive and all-inclusive. It is also one reason why we also need more locally developed and/or funded policies and programs, and why we need for private charities to be truly privately funded.

We need faith-based initiatives in our local communities, and we need for them to be completely divorced from government funding. That is the only way they will have the flexibility and discretion needed to fill cracks. At the very local level, the small monies available from rector discretionary funds are crucial to heading off personal disasters because a family fallen on hard times can't pay the rent on a storage unit where all their personal items have been moved during a period of homelessness, avoiding evictions and utility cut-offs, and paying the medicaid co-pay for prescription drugs when money has gone instead to replace the water-pump on the old car.

Janie