Interesting one. When addressing the oversight of congress had always sided with the legitimate requirement of the administration to comply with our oversight. Afterwards airs on book tv every saturday at 10 00 p. M. You can watch all previous programs on our website. [inaudible] thank you so much for coming out tonight. As we have the honor of hosting Daniel Hatcher for his new book the poverty industry. I work with the event staff here and i have a few quick notes we want to say before i introduce daniel tonight. This is a event. It is the Newest Partnership weve have going on for about a year we are hosting events. You can also find us at the other location. We have different events that will be scheduled throughout the city. Now youre in a restaurant and you can order food and drink at the same time. I encourage you to do so. And tweet treat your wait staff while. Please silence your cell phones so we dont have any other necessary interruptions. After its over you can have a signing table and an opportunity to chat with Daniel Hatcher. Also, there is can be time for question and answer and i have this handy microphone right here. If you will raise your hand during that section and i will come around so that everyone can hear the questions and then being asked and also book tv is here tonight from cspan. You can look yourself up on the inter web later. Anyway. So in this eyeopening examination of what happens to medicaid and medicare funds and childsupport payments and other public assistance designed for the ill, the abused andy elderly he exposes how the forprofit agencies themselves benefit from government programs. They offered ways to reform policy so that it does in fact reach its intended beneficiary. They said of this book it is a researched book. Daniel hatcher is professor of law at the university of ultima he teaches civil advocacy clinics. As a staff attorney for legal aid in the baltimore time. Please welcome Daniel Hatcher. [applause] thank you everybody for being here. It is such a beautiful Late Afternoon and early evening to talk about some important policy issues. Thank you to politics and prose. Thank you for the amazing support in publishing this book. I definitely think the university of baltimore, school of law and law and the Clinical Programs there. With honors to teach students. It is amazing and the kids i think my past clients i have learned so much from their stories over the years and what they are going through and from an individual basis of seeing their difficulties and trying to try to understand how their problems connect on a more systemic level. I hope to keep this in formal and have a conversation and i thought i would start with comparison and then back up a little bit with some of the introduction. So in new york on monday and we were talking about a county there. There was a small story about a child whose adoptive mother died of cancer and apparently have Survivor Benefits and a bank account and saved about 16,000. The concern with the press is that the social worker got a hold of the child they had access to the bank account. There is some outrage. It was brought. And that county officials put out press releases to talk about going after this individual. Countywide this is a county that has a contract with the mechanization not just Survivor Benefits but also disability benefits potentially more. The county is taking the money from children in their care when they are acting under a fiduciary relationship. Were talking about tens of tens of thousands of dollars. No one has been up in arms about that because no one has known. My hope through getting this book out is to increase awareness and i think with awareness we have a potential to bring change. So in the Property Industry im hoping to expose and explain several of these revenue practices where space and state Human Service agencies are partnering with come companies. This is happening i think across the country because states are crashed cashstrapped. They are alike across the country. When you see that occurring you end up having the space looking for money elsewhere sort of behindthescenes even to the point where they are using their own agencies to divert funds from the population. I had been looking into these issues for quite a while bold through and some policy advocacy efforts and i think it started for me almost 20 years ago my first job at legal aid was in baltimore city. I represented kids in the foster care system. My first day in court i represented about 16 children in an afternoon. So honestly i still feel some guilt from that time and i feel like i should have done more. But i was awakened to what foster kids were going through in the system and what they were going through before they came into the system and how hard it is for them when they age out of care. In the stats are really lined up against foster children. This was alarming to me when i realized that the very agencies that exist to have foster care children was trying to find the way. Finding a way to seek out disability or Survivor Benefits and take control of those monies as a representative payee and then get those funds. I then started doing some work as well with low income families in Child Support issues including representing fathers which was eyeopening to me with the difficulties as well. They were stationed not only with the Survivor Benefits from children for taking Child Support from children. Sometimes the same children. They go after that. Nebraska as a regulation. And now i drafted it. Even the earnings that were old enough to work. So Child Support that is diverted from the childrens best interests and i started to learn as well about the practices that are occurring with medicaid and even more dollars that is being diverted from the purpose. So i wanted to try to understand and dig in connect these issues as much as i can. With the book i try to step back a bit and see all these connections happening. The alarm that im seeing is you are seeing the shift in State Government and the state Human Service agencies that exist to serve the Public Welfare instead they are turning the focus on maximizing revenue and even hiring companies to help in that process. So, before i want to exit discuss a few of the examples i want to stress a couple of themes that i hope, of the book. The first one is i dont think it provides any evidence for arguments to cut aid to those who need the assistance and the work that ive done it is drastically underfunded and as you have state that governors who are diverting the funds from intended purpose you want to cut the aid or the aid program. The other thing i hope to stress and i want to keep making a point of i think the vast majority of our front line caseworkers in this country are overworked and underpaid trying to do the best they can for their clients. They are not having it on the ground and its much higher at the state agency. They are really directing the practices. To talk a little bit more about this practice of how they are using the foster children. Many states will partner with revenue mac dissemination dash maximization. They started with an assessment contract to do an assessment to look statewide. The children as a Revenue Generating mechanism. From at that time they were increase that number. With the state. When this occurs is not even benefiting fiscally. But the agencies themselves arent getting any more financial capacities. With the agencies that they take from children. Its becoming a selffunded roster care system. And they are still saving state dollars. In addition to going after this they seek out Survivor Benefits. Under the Social Security program. They are earned benefits when we work and pay into the system and also Survivor Benefits if we have to do that after we die. Its much like life insurance. I brewed represented client a former foster child in maryland who have this issue happened him and when he was placed in foster care right after his mother died he was moved around to several different places and couldnt find permanent placement for him. Then his brother dies. They locate his father and his father was a potential resource for him. His family is dying and the Foster Agency realizes they are entitled to a survivor benefit. They never tell him they are applying for the benefit. Then they were taking that. They struggle ever since. To think about conserving it. He never have a drivers license. They might have provided an immense connection to his deceased parents. Not just the money when a parent dies it couldve provided that. Instead the state took it. In many states one of those benefits. The list goes on. And they obtained some contract documents. They are described as the resources on a Conveyor Belt and be described as a units again with the revenue generated mechanism. Its who gets the most money. A goal of increasing the penetration rate of children whose resources can be obtained. Ive seen documents especially concerning as well when they consider which kids to try to determine that. Which kids bring in the most money. Those kids may have other sources of financial aid. Garlands of their condition after they are causing them to spend more money. It is all about the money which unfortunately its not about helping the children. Another example this is just one starting with the bonds. In some states are diverting from intended purpose. You could even have the same foster child. They can also receive in their Schools School schoolbased and medicated to medicated to provide Additional Services and their disabling conditions. I described an example in the book about new jersey where the state forces schools to participate in a program and have a different revenue contract that they are dealing with. They are required to work for the contract. The schools are punished in new jersey if they dont meet the target goals by reduction in School Funding from the state and then went after it. This is how they determine how much money well have the goals. And then the state in their budget items is diverting over 80 of those funds from the schoolchildren to the general state. And then tens of millions of dollars every year. They are literally being taken from poor, disabled schoolchildren to save the state. Like all the states who are unwilling to raise enough revenue and looking for money elsewhere even taking money from disabled schoolchildren. They are selling advertisements. That is another example involving children. The other age into the spectrum are Nursing Homes unfortunately in this country. Theyre not doing very well. The quality of care on average. In some states its much worse than others. Sometimes the richest estate per capitas gets it degraded according to some reports. At that time the district of columbias is doing a little better. Much of it has to do with the Nursing Homes. They have to provide sufficient staff. We have the capacity for better funding. Especially low income older americans. They are often used in some similar strategies in many states will defer to bonds for the intended purpose. There are some municipalities and counties for it. One of the examples i described is out of indiana where its happening like the statewide first. There are multiple revenue finding mechanisms that are loose. They are moved around and is supposed to be a matching grant program. So they spend their percentage max and then they claim the match from the federal government. If it spends 50 you can claim an additional money. It goes for the type of care. What you are seeing that states are moving money around and sometimes they will charge that. And then they get the money back. One way or another so its not actually spending any state funds. That in and of itself is concerning because its loose. What concerns me a lot more is the states that when they claim that federal aid that there diverting it to the general. Indianapolis they have also found a way where the health and Hospital Corporation out of indianapolis its the Municipal Agency they figure out away and started buying up forprofit Nursing Homes. Another all over the state of indiana. They have bought up forprofit Nursing Homes because in india not the way that it works they can trigger higher medicaid. What they are doing is they are buying the licenses for the nursing home and often they were hiding dash make hiring the same licenses back. Its intended for better care. To help the corporation use it to build a multimillion dollar new hospital system. At least that is then that being used for healthcare purposes but that is not the intent. That money for that facility would have normally occurred through property taxes and waste to waive the revenue. They are using older americans. They are trying to take their funds all around the corner of the state. When the northwestern corner of indiana. That is a concern. Finally and then i will pause a bit for questions there are more examples of this occurring in some of them i have the length of space to get involved in the book. But they know about the prison industrial complex. Many of the same contractors who are involved in the military are not actually involved in the poverty industry. They are involved in Child Support services. They used to have the contractor run this Child Support office. They helped the state obtain benefits which the state that will take for the children. As an example of the scope of this poverty industry give agencies right after that they dont have the capacity to monitor their own private contracts and they are hiring private contractors an example of the scope initiated is started in dc. They have a contract to help the district of columbia it something called the doj. There may have been false claims. To the point of a Settlement Agreement with the department of justice. The deferred prosecution agreement was there. Just a short time of that. They get a contract with the state of new york. But after they have the allegations. Then a short time of that they enter new contracts or continuous existing contracts. And this is the same federal agency to which those claims were submitted. Within a short time of that the same Company Lands a contract with the department of justice itself. The agency and the department of justice. And to investigate. During the investigation and prosecution of the criminal cases. The industry is expanding i hope there are some red flags. They are being diverted from those of us that need us the most. It is more of a focus on revenue rex dash maximization. I think a really crucial theme for us we are all vulnerable. We are all interconnected. And with the government and institutions that are supposed to be serving us. We are one paycheck away from poverty. We need to remember when a foster charter is harmed it harms all of us not just from a moral perspective but financially if you think about the finances. They have a harder time when the age out of foster care. More likely to become dependent on the Public Welfare system. The number of former children is just huge. We all pay the cost. Hopefully you will remember all of that. [applause] i think you for being here. But what i have said and i ask about said that i might be in the books nonetheless. We celebrate ten years. When it comes to this i have to ask what do you have to say about the whole idea about most dash most vulnerable versus least vulnerable. I see cities not just one had been reluctant to help homeless adults to remain in the city and find a different way. Is all about supportive housing. I personally think that the constant focus is in some way covered. We want that. We dont want to address the elephant in the room. The fact that it takes 30 an hour to live in dc. We dont want to address the high risk and low wages. Those are opportunities at the federal law that requires in my experience has been it takes a federal law and initiative to make dc do anything better so now we are starting to brainstorm on how to connect there was a lot of nonprofits who would rather keep serving the disabled. They are lifelong cash cows. They will be helped when others would get put into a job and no longer be dependent on the system. See make great comments and questions and you are right. I think we could talk for several days about these issues and its a great discussion. I agree with much if not most of what you said. I guess the start what i think is you alluded to this as well. You are saying that theyre happening and red states and blue states. I hope first, we can all disagree about the best structure its what its all about. Regardless of our politics public aid that develops for the specific purpose. It should be used as attended. They are also not working well. We have a good amount of work with individuals who are there. They are impacted by a lot of the issues. I had worked with a lot of those individuals into Child Support obligations. So not the most politically popular group. But they need assistance and the labels are not accurate. Most individuals are labeled there. Some are in between. This is the Child Support practice is taken from the children and they are forcing port mothers to sue for fathers for money that doesnt even help the children. To look at that. When they have children at a young age. They have potential for the families to work well together. And even if they dont end up living together. But when you force a mother to sue a poor father that will not do much for that relationship. If youve you have a father thats coming out of prison and history to get back on his feet and live above board in the regular economy he has 20 or 30,000 in debt. And then if he doesnt land a job despite the criminal record those are difficulties in themselves. A lot of the individuals in that case will quit. They will work underground so there had spent some support against low income populations like that especially when that money is there. He can actually cause an increase in criminal activity. One of the most powerful things about your argument is that what you are saying is that all of these practices are legal where the vast majority of them are. Its very interesting to think about what solutions you would propose in that context in the systems and practices that can be dehumanizing that youre really talking to a system where people are being moved around like beans. And if that is for the most part lawful we would be very serious about where we should go from here. I do think unfortunately some of the practices are likely within the realm of the legal. I am stubborn and i think many of them are not. Its a practice regarding foster children. They are taking the funds there is a legal question that has not been resolved across the country that is a reach of obligation. The state is taking on a roll both as guardian initially in their state role and then when they take on the role like that that is a dish you are a roll. If youve a space that takes on that obligation and said we are gonna take the childs money and apply it to the pay back state cost how is that not of breach of obligation. It hasnt been decided yet but i hope people will bring clients to that effect. Regarding some of the other practices when the state is taking Child Support from children that is under federal and state law. It is a posse i hope will change. As its a failed effort on what is called welfare Cost Recovery i provide both the policy concerns in the legal analysis. Even after just looking how the states are doing and taking the money from children to pay back the cost of children when you look at the numbers the states are very likely spending much more in administrative costs than they are collecting because parents are poor. Their spending much more than they are collecting. When medicaid i do think there needs to be some stronger analysis to look at. The core purpose of medicaid is to help states provide additional medicaid services. The mansion grant program. When you have a state like new jersey who is completely sending funds. What i think is happening as this has been known about for many years part of it is capacity and federal agencies dont have the capacity to track what states are doing. Often they are not transparent. And it gets even harder because most of us its hard enough to figure out what the states are doing with their money. If you really try to follow the money. Some of the problems the agencies currently had we wouldnt need regulatory change if we decide to enforce what is already there and make it clear that if you had funds claimed on behalf of the nursing home resident that they are supposed to be used for medicaid purposes. Its not complicated. I hope that will be the case. Just a followup on this shifting of the view of young people and children and turning them from actual people in tate revenue stream. Can you look backward a little bit for me and kind of explain the evolution of the language because we know when they first started the program they were thinking of terms of children was it welfare reform. At one point they started to do it less than human. At what point is our answer. What ive seen with that particular practice of states looking to obtain resources from foster children much of that terminology at least when the company has come in. They were able to entice many of the foster care the number of children that they could obtain benefits from. They take a cut of this as a contingency fee. These are businesses. They exist and make a profit that is their purpose so they are using terminology in their contracts that sound like that and that is the case where they describe children as a Revenue Generating mechanism. [inaudible] the secretary he testified against one of the bills i worked on in maryland. We had worked on this years now and the agency has testified and blocked it. His talk to the secretary of Human Resources and stood up and he described foster care is like a business. I think that is a pretty unfortunate statement. When we are trying to maximize revenue rather than to revenue the Public Welfare of children its for all of us. And you are cnet happen across the country. There was a good story in the New York Times earlier this week about this occurring in the area of Public Safety both with 911. That happens as a result of that. I was going to talk about this from a different point of view. Ive been living this my whole life. I am a disabled lawyer and i would say that the nonprofits are doing the same thing as you are talking about. One is Legal Services and one is protection and advocacy. And mostly im talking about Northern Virginia where ive been looking at the last few years. You have Legal Services that is receiving funds to help people with disabilities. When im a Disability Lawyer they are not hiring people with stability to do the work to help us. We need to look at ourselves first. I can sympathize. And in virginia they live 80 of the poverty levels. We are not doing really great. But this is a problem. I think it comes to help a population and should be hiring people when you see that work. You should be hiring people to work with disabled people. Ive been doing this and im 62 years old. These are great comments. I was a legal aid lawyer. I have seen the process even where you have multiple organizations going after grants if there is a limited amount of money. And we need to remember in that case as an advocate not to use lose sight of the goal. Its about working yourself out of a job. Sometimes people forget that. I think it is a wonderful point. Thank you for being here. This is what we need in the inspector general. Without help. There had been reports in the past with medicaid and some of the other practices. There really has not been there is some discussion in that. The so security advisory board. Where they are looking in this issue regarding as i benefits. I had have the opportunity to work with amy hartfield. On a potential federal bill. They might be looking at the likely bill that could be introduced. We need a look about what is really happening. Then taking the money is bad. Delegate should be occurring but the process that theyre going through and targeting based on how much money rather than the disabling need. There are some real concerns there. They are using the various financing tools. There are incentives for states to pay less to the Health Care Providers so that they can take advantage of the gap between the actual dedicated payments. You could pay them less. Then they could take advantage of that payment. Oregon was doing this. Using medicaid funds to fund the entire state public education. Last year federal government enacted something called able act that allows for children who receive ssi benefits, disability benefits for children of those funds can be conserved in 529a plans. The same sorts of saving vehicle wes use now for 529 plans for education savings. Now theyre opened up where disabled children can use the benefits to use in the expanded savings plans for a whole host of other types of services the child may need to serve to meet their disabling needs and to then become independent as a adult. So this is available right now. Foster children are not able to benefit because the state is taking their money. We need the states to stop taking the funds and then the kids can save the money for their own money to plan for their future, and not just the money but it could that money could then trigger a planning process, right, or children could be engaged with social workers to think about how do they most want to use and conserve their fund for future care andlash Financial Literacy through the process of empowerment and you name it. Its up limited in terms of resource thats gone to waste right now. Dan, thank you again for your book. We have worked together on the issue related to foster children, and its in contest of the larger poverty industry which is a way to try. The issues. The question has to do with cuppability and shame. Were talking about a rather insidious practice nationwide of basically stealing from poor people and we Work Together physically on the Social Security issue but i wonder writing this book and investigating these practices in different communities relating to different federal benefits, you introduce this by talking about the reason that some of this is happening because states are tax strapped because tacks are low. So what youre talking about is a problem thats been imposed upon states who become desperate and scramble for any money they can get their hand on and its easiest to reach into the pockets of poor people who might not be represent or might not know their rights. But im wondering if you number one, if you see the tax problem is potentially solving this, or whether its so insidious it has seeped into the moral fiber of the agencies were talking about, practicing these things and what your experience was of speaking to people who had a sense of shame about what they were doing, about it being morally wrong and morally bankrupt to a practice using the good question. Great questions. I do think its a horrible practice. Again issue want to stress, i think frontline caseworkers arent doing this. Theyre not the ones who often even know about the practices. Thats much higher up. With the agency its the secretary level. Someone who has a business background, but to be fair to him, it was happening before he was there, so this is happening both on the Omalley Administration and now under the hogan administration, and maryland, so this is happening in blue states and red states alike. I hope that states will i dont think theyll look too low of revenue in the states unwilling to raise taxes sufficiently but to raise enough revenue in taxation for general taxation. Thats a decision their making and then looking for money elsewhere. So, i also like we talked about privatization. I have my own concerns with privatization, significants concerns the thrust of the book is not that as much because at the end of the day its the state leaders who are determining the scope of the contracts and the purpose of the contracts and how the money is used. Our governor in maryland who decides after they work with this company, at the highest up levels they decide well take that money and divert it to state coffers. I think another red flag i hope comes out of the book, on the same theme in terms of state control, theres been an increasing number of proposals over the years to increase what are called block grants, and ryan has proposed this before. Trump even on his web site wants the block grant medicaid program. The book, being as objectives i can, provides evidence that block grants a horrible idea. If you have even if you thoughting that my be a good idea in the first place but under the evidence that comes out, if you have governors who are using this eliasry shell games to move money around and then divert funds from the intended purpose, under a complex Regulatory Framework from the federal government, whats that governor going to do if theyre provided a blank check that says, hope you help the poor. When its a state that is cash strapped and is unwilling to raise revenue youre not going to see more money going to those who needed. Youll see much, much greater waste if block grants were to occur. I want to echo others and thank you for what seems to be an extraordinarily important work. Thank you so much. You can pass on this if you want. When the governors calculate that they can play these games, i think theyre calculating that if what theyre doing becomes public, the citizens in their state are not going to vote them out in horror. I think its i think it speaks horribly about our culture and our country at this point in time. I wonder if you have any comments on that. Sure. In part i do hope awareness matters. That as we become more aware of these practices, that we will be outraged to the point where we hold elected officials accountable to do what is right and use money intended for the vulnerable to truly help the vulnerable. But unfortunately, too often, the most vulnerable among us dont have a loud voice in the political process. I think were all responsible for that. To help increase that voice as we have become asquare help those aware and help those who more vulnerable than us to this sounds like kumbiya moment but i think were all connected. Right . We need to remember that. Were all vulnerable. We need to Work Together. What how a child is impacted, foster care child is impacted in baltimore affects all of us and i hope we can start to realize that again. You brought all of our attention to the there you are. You brought to our attention the murky practices of different federal organizations, even private organizations, with the certain shadowy games they play in essence to create revenue. Do you believe that regulation or more oversight could tackle this issue or has it become such a large problem both on the federal and local level . Im optimistic we can fix and improve these problem. Its not going to happen overnight, right . But i do very much think that we can improve sometimes it will require more sounds like dirty word in some populations to say more regulation but to clarify regulation and clamp down to say if you medicaid funds claimed for a poor older american, then that money is intended to help that poor older american. Right . I think that is already present. We just need to make that more clear. Same thing with the practices that are using foster children, Child Support is going to take a broader change because theyre both federal and state law. I actually i know that many of the leaders of Child Support agencies around the country agree with what im saying. They realize that much so much of what is called Child Support that is owed to the government is not being collected and win its being collected its harming kids. Theres an effort at the federal level to improve the rules and very good progression own those lines at the federal level the problem is to get the states to act on those opportunities. Much of what is happening at the federal level is giving states options that they could take to make improvements. So, it then falls again back to us to inform our state leaders about why these changes are helpful and necessary. And maryland is an example. One of the things that maryland could do this gets a little complex but the way in which they collect Child Support for low income populations, often times the most they get is through tax intercepts. Usually the money went sometimes money owed to the government and some owed to the child because of a parent was receiving cash asince stance assistance door child or a child was in foster care. Usually the family gets their money first. Families first policy. Theres a big exception to that through tax intercepts. The most successful way to go after the money. So theres legislation in maryland that would simply say, if this money is collect through tax intercept, lets pay the kids in the family before the state takes theirs. Theyre not saying the state has to give away their obligation but pay the family first. The ahead of the state Child Support agency stood up and testified against that bill, and actually made what i thought were incorrect statements, saying that the agency was giving up this money when it wasnt the case. It was shifting who collects. I know that gets into too much detail but we need to be aware. Some of this is complex. We need to be aware of what is occurring and them hold to the to be accountable for doing the right thing. First of all i want to thank you for the work youre doing, like other people have. Heard you on wpfp. Shoutout yes. I was intrigued by the things i heard. I was disappointed but not surprised. I have a child that is now an adult that is disabled. And the challenges that i went through to get Social Security for a known disability that he has had since he was very small, was very complicated and hard. Here the states are going through nothing and getting this speaks to me because im a retired federal employee that of collusion. Does Social Security administration know this is happening, Social Security administration, for whatever reason, is colluding with the states to make this appear, and i would argue, and im going to buy your book but i would argue that there is sufficient law and regulation in place now to hold this make this practice stop. I figured that. This is my question to you. When youre dealing with situations like this, we always want to say, the states are doing x and doing y, the municipalities. These states are doing nothing. Individual are making calculated decisions, and until we have individual accountability, as this young lady said over here, nothing will change. You say youre hopeful. Because i understand the politics of this, that these corporations pay the legislators, who then make sure that their interests are taken care of, because you follow the money both up and down, until we get Campaign Finance changes or how political officials get their money, you cannot stop the corporate influence on these. This is just for them lowhanging fruit. What are your comments to the political aspect and the controlling the politicians by money . Well, first, i agree with you when you say wheneye the phrase, the state. The state is made up of people and i do think that the responsibility lies with our state leaders, who are aware these practices are occurring. Sometimes theyre initiating them. Sometimes they inherit them from prior administrations but that doesnt make it okay. Ive heard the excuse in maryland when i worked in legislation the practice of the Foster Care Agency take resources from children. Other states are doing this, too. How they even use that as an argument is beyond me other. States are doing bad stuff. That makes it good stuff . I dont think that works. But im hopeful. I refuse not to be, i guess, and like i think as we increase awareness, i think i hope all of us here and beyond us as we become aware these practices are occurring we can let our elect officials know that we know and try to help stop those practices, but youre right, with the one particular process that you mentioned, how the agencies are taking resources from foster children, there doesnt have to be a legislative change. Could be. We could simply very much fix it through legislation, but the agency could do it right now, or the states could do the right thing right now. So, i hope that people become aware of what needs to happen, and im very much hopeful because the Social Security administration is starting to look at this. Im going to participate in a Panel Discussion july 12th july 12th that i think is occurring, including with elected officials from congress and folks who have been former commissioners of the Social Security administration. Im hopeful but youre right, its an uphill battle. Good evening. I want to echo everyone elses sentiment in thanking you for being here, thank you for the important work youre doing. My question involves whether the motivation that allot of the states are that a lot of the states are using to with these practices, to pursue these revenue strategies, is really one based on cash strapped, particularly looking at the state of maryland. Theres definitely annapolis has an appetite for increasing taxes, particularly with governor omalley, with income tax increases, gas tax increases and some county government increasing property taxes. So, in the states that are fiscally more prosperous in a sense and have had the means to raise revenue through taxes is the issue really not one of revenue shortage but more of a fundamental issue of morality, priority, and basically a moral issue that some people just dont matter, and in addition to that, it could also be influenced from lobbyists, corporations that are benefiting from these practices. And so in that sense might not necessarily be a cash strapped state but the system that is broken. Its both. Do think that priorities are incredibly important, and unfortunately when a state is facing lean budget times, the services for those who need state assistance the most are the First Services to get cut. I think thats very unfortunate because, again, it hurts all of us. But i do think, like when we we could have a long, broad discussion about this you. Look back through history the level of taxation in which states have been willing to use to raise revenue through general tack racing is much lower than in the past. Were an expanding, growing, complicated society, greater and greater needs. We need government for this. And government needs to have funding to provide the services that we need. So, i hope at some point taxes become a dirty word. Thats probably even more pie in the sky than the other comments i made. But i hope so. Paying taxes is patriotic, one of the most patriotic things to do. We have time for three more questions. You have thrown a lot of problems at us, and they dont seem to be all of the same cloth. I mean, the conflict of interest problem with the states or private agencies serving as the representative payee at the same time that theyre supposed to be protecting the interests of that client, seems to be a very significant problem but theres an easy fix for that. There should be an easy fix. Right. Whether it comes from the federal government or from the State Government. Or the courts. Or the courts. And, yet the politics of social welfare is often being addressed by issues around guaranteed income. We could avoid all of this if we just got a check for everybody for certain amount of money and see how they can sink or swim on their own with that entitlement. You have not mentioned that example of a solution. But i think that is one of the elephants in the room when problems like this do get raised. The privatization issue you have identified but sort of didnt put that front and center here. Thats correct. And im just wondering how whether all these issues ought to be addressed in a more comprehensive way, maybe even in terms of what dem mock creatization of the Human Service planning ought to look like at a Community Level or whd tackle these one by one based on interests of each groups. Comments you elicited here. Some people are saying people with disabilities have some special advantages over general welfare clients, and im just wondering how, having not looked at your book, how to frame the issues so that were actually not just muddying the waters further or catering to the strongest Interest Groups but actually creating a more humanistic society like apparently exists in so many other social welfare societies. Where you can count on the government to be more protective of the publics interests. Excellent comments, and to respond to those, youre talking bat multivolume set. So, my hope with the book is to spur discussion, much like youre initiating, and i think that kind of discussion and disagreement amongst us is a good thing. We need to start a dialogue. Theres a phrase probably going butch theirs, an einstein phrase, saw it on the internet so must be true was something along the lines of, an hour to fix any problem, you spend the first 55 minutes trying to understand the problem. Right . So too often we are too quick to want to rush forward before we stop and sit back and look at what is happening. So, most of the book is looking at the problem. One set of problems. Not even all the problems but one set of them. And i hope that does spur much needed discussion and to think about how we can start solving these. Maybe in my future writings i want to continue to do that but much of what youre talking about are things im thinking about. Its a hard discussion. It should be simple. Like when we disagree how to structure programs for vulnerable populations, we ought to be able to agree that money that is structured, already put forth, created with intended purpose, that money should be used at intended, regardless of politics we show agree that money should not be diverted from intended use. Thank you for the question. Thanks again, dan, for this great to see you, debbie. Theres so much to be outraged about in this book, and im not a lawyer, as you know, but how can it be legal theres so many broad issues but just on this somewhat narrower issue of states becoming representative payees for, say, foster children, children in foster care, and not even telling them, taking all the money, in your book you mention one horrible example of a child should have inherited or did inherit a home that was a habit for humanity home. Out of north carolina. And the representative payee refused the state, refused to pay the very small mortgage 220 mortgage for habitat for humanity home. So that coot have been an asset for the child that was lost for that reason. He would have aged out of foster care and had a home. How can this be legal and is there a litigation strategy that is possible, that finds the right courts to take this to or Something Like that. I love that question, and i dont know hough its legal. I dont think its legal and i do think there are litigation strategies. We have ive been involved in some pretty substantial litigation, in maryland, both representing the child i described earlier, alex, one of my clients, and then also involved as i was cocounsel for amickey in a case where the american Legal Aide Bureau representing a child named ryan. We had success in that state. The court of appeals in maryland found that the Foster Care Agency was violating foster childrens constitutional Due Process Rights by failing to provide notice. I wanted them to go further and find it was breach of fiduciary responsibilities. And they can put fortha forth a family member, probono organization, childded a co casey organization senioring as a representative payee in a volunteer tear capacity, represent that child. And the childs money the way its supposed to but i agree, think its illegal. There are many other layers of this legal argument but the easiest one and strongest argument is breach of fiduciary obligations. Right . I hope that more lawyers across the country bring these claims. Most people dont know its happening. And when they do know its happening, unfortunately another part of the problem is many of in many of the States Foster children dont have lawyers they have advocates, guardian ad litems who are not lawyers or the lawyers are overworked. Huge case loads. To take on a case like this takes an enormous amount of time. So thats part of the challenge but doesnt mean indont think we should try. So great question and i hope that we both try to improve this through policy advocaciy and through litigation. Thank you. A question . One more . All right. Im sure you wont like this but i have to say im unable to remember when i have seen such a combination of brilliance, compassion, humility, in one person. Its quite amazing. Thank you for being you. [applause] thank you. [applause] i just do what my mama tells me to do. No. I appreciate that comment. Its look. I think i try to work hard and i care about things. When i see issues i cant not unsee those issues that i have encountered. I said earlier, i feel guilt i didnt do enough for the children i represented years ago, but its the vulnerable populations who are dealing with these issues who are the heroes. When i see foster kids who can go through the circumstances they go through and come out and find some level of success and happiness and work and care about others. Thats heroic. Im just trying to report the facts. But i do appreciate the comments very much. Tell your mother thank you. I will. Thank you. Lets take one more. Thank daniel onemer final for coming out. Thank you. [applause] you, purchase the book at the front over the book store and well be there later after we continue signing. Thank you for coming out. Thank you everybody. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversation] [inaudible conversations] heres a look at some of the current bestselling book according to the conservative book club. Topping the list, former secret Service Officer gary burn talks about his experiences working in the clinton out who in crisis of character. Followed by fox news host bill oreillys second companion book to his legends and lies series. In wakeup america, fox news host eric bowling outlines nine characteristics such as grit, manliness and dominion over the environment that he believes helped make america great. And he argues that the country has lost its way. Next up on the conservative Book Club List is brad thors International Spy thriller, Foreign Agent and also the intimidation game. She argues the political left is trying to limit freedom of speech. You can see her on book tvs after Words Program in the coming weeks. A look at the best selling books continues with, if you can keep it in which eric metaxis weighs in on the intentions of the Founding Fathers when they wrote the constitution, and the state of liberty in america today. And in killing kennedy really looks at the assassination of president john f. Kennedy. Next, former bill Clinton Campaign adviser, dick morris, lays out a strategy in carmageddon he thinks willied donald trump to victory in the 2016 election, and republican strategic Peter Sweitzer criticizes the financial dealings of the clinton in clinton cash. Rounding out the list, cores terrorism righter looks at how the fight against extremism can be won in defeating jihads. A look at current best sellers. Many of the authors have appeared or will appear on