CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Members of the Legislative Oversight Commission on Health and Human Resources Accountability learned more Monday about draft legislation which would require drug testing of those receiving Temporary Assistance for Needy Families.
“The draft legislation would require the Department of Health and Human Resources to develop a three-year pilot program to be operated statewide and seek federal approval for drug testing of public assistance applicants to the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families Program,” said Jeff Johnson, Counsel of the Senate Committee on Health and Human Resources as he explained the draft bill to members of the committee.
The program would require drug testing when there is “reasonable suspicion” an individual receiving state assistance had been using drugs.
“The applicant demonstrates qualities indicative of substance abuse based upon the indicators of the drug screen, the applicant had been convicted of a drug related offense in the five preceding years, or the applicant or parent or parents of a newborn within five days of birth tests positive for certain controlled substances.”
Under the draft any parent who tests positive could continue receiving benefits if they agreed to undergo a course of substance abuse treatment and education. Any applicant who tests positive will have to complete a substance abuse counseling and treatment program and a jobs program, said Johnson. He added the draft also includes language involving a second or third offense of drug use. A second offense would result in suspension of TANF funds for a year and a third offense would result in them being cut off for good.
Senator Ron Stollings (D-Boone) raised a couple of questions during the meeting about the program. Stollings worried by removing children from welfare homes where one or both guardians tested positive would tax an already fragile and overburdened foster care system.
He also raised the possibility of a positive test of THC, a product which gets into the system from smoking marijuana. Stollings questioned what would happen to an applicant who had just arrived from a state where recreational or medicinal marijuana is legal.
“THC stays in yours system sometimes weeks and may be even months,” said Stollings.
“THC is illegal in West Virginia as you know and yes, they would be denied,” Johnson added.