The Women of Color Resource Center will present on how the right wing is using "family cap" welfare policies to manipultate the reproductive health choices of poor women. We will explore and expose the ways in which institutions such as the welfare system shapes the access to health and well being of low-income women, and how the intersections of race, gender and class meet within this context to create a coersive environmemt for low-income women. In order to adequately discuss the current policies, we will take a look at how the welfare system came to be and how low income communities of color have been perceived within it. We will also discuss the history of the welfare system, who it ways created for and who has been excluded.

Particpants will take away an understanding of the intent of some welfare policies and will leave the presentation equiped with the information needed to repeal these same policies in their home states (we have compiled all of our work in a blog that we will share with particants). Particpants will be engaged through discussion and a provocative power point presentation.

The Women of Color Resource Center, together with partner organizations, has surveyed 200 women who receive CalWORKS benefits in Alameda, San Joaquin and Los Angeles counties to find out how child exclusion laws in California have impacted the reproductive health decisions of low-income women and the everyday lives of poor children who have been denied benefits through child exclusion laws. We plan to present our survey findings at the conference. We will also discuss the introduction of AB 22 – The Provide for Each Child Act that would repeal child exclusion welfare policies in 2007/2008 legislative session.

According to our sisters at Asian Communities for Reproductive Justice, Reproductive Health calls for a vision in which women, their families and communities have the economic, social and political power and resources to make healthy decisions about our bodies, sexuality and reproduction for ourselves. The regulation of the reproductive decisions of women of color has been a central aspect of racial, class and gender oppression in the U.S. and is continuing to become more restrictive and punitive. Child exclusion policies are being used by the right to Manipulate the reproductive health choices of women of color by excluding their children from receiving cash assistance and coercing them into making reproductive choices that they might not have made otherwise.

“Child exclusion” laws, also known as “family caps” or the “maximum family grant” rule have been implemented by state welfare agencies to discourage poor women who receive welfare benefits from having more children. States with child exclusion laws prevent children from receiving cash benefits if they are born to mothers or fathers who were already receiving welfare benefits. In the past, a families’ cash grant was based on the size of the family and would increase when a mother on welfare has an additional baby.

Child exclusion laws were often passed in state legislatures during a time when some people believed that mothers on welfare had babies to collect welfare checks. Studies indicate that these beliefs are simply not the case because the increase that comes with the birth of each child is barely enough to pay for diapers, clothes, and other basic necessities. Many states have rejected efforts to impose caps. A few states have actually reversed course and lifted caps since the passage of TANF.

Studies are mixed about whether child exclusion laws either decrease childbirth rates or increase the rates of abortion. There are no conclusive and reliable studies that indicate that this law achieves the goal of decreasing birthrates among poor women. Although, those that wrote the policies have been exlpicit about its intent. Child exclusion policies are coercive; compromise the fundamental reproductive rights of women; punish infants and toddlers for the actions of their parents; have especially negative impacts on communities of color; and drive poor families into deeper poverty. These policies also violate international human rights norms.

There has been no research conducted on the impact of child exclusion laws on the well being of children. Despite the lack of research, it is logical to think these policies hurt children based on the information we already have on the consequences of poverty on children. Child exclusion laws harm children because it is the children in a family that are “capped” from getting the cash aid, and as a result, it impacts the entire family. Second, this law applies to people of all races and both genders. However, this law is more likely to be implemented in states with a large African-American or Latino populations.