AUBURN – Attempted misuse of a state welfare benefits card by an inmate inside the Androscoggin County Jail has prompted the Sheriff’s Department to restrict use of the jail’s ATM machine.
Electronic benefit transfer cards issued by the Maine Department of Health and Human Services may be used to get access to Food Stamp and Temporary Assistance to Needy Families benefits, much in the way debit cards work at grocery stores and in automated teller machines. The cards can also be used to draw out cash from TANF benefits at some ATMs.
At issue is an incident Tuesday where a correctional officer escorted an inmate to the ATM inside the jail to allow the male prisoner to withdraw funds to deposit into his jail commissary account. The correctional officer stopped the man from using a state human services benefits card when he noticed that the card was not a bank ATM or credit card. The matter was immediately brought to the attention of Androscoggin County Jail Administrator Capt. John Lebel.
“My concern is these guys could use these cards to bail themselves out. That’s yours and my hard-earned dollars. Those dollars are designated to support the family. If a guy wants to bail himself out, that’s an abuse of the system,” Lebel said.
County Commission Chairman Elmer Berry agreed and said steps were being taken Thursday to restrict use of the ATM at the jail. “I’ve got a real problem with people doing that,” Berry said. He expressed concern that misuse of state debit cards intended for family benefits could take money away from children. “By tomorrow morning (Friday) it (the ATM) won’t take them.”
The state does not prohibit use of EBT cards for jail money, according to DHHS spokesperson Mike Norton.
The inmate using the EBT card to obtain cash while in jail “is not, strictly speaking, illegal. But if a person is doing it, they are probably not going to succeed in the (TANF) program,” Norton said, stressing that TANF is intended as a boost for families to get off public assistance with employment as a goal. He said people going to jail frequently and those misusing the benefits are not likely to achieve the goals of the program.
“There is no way to know if a person misuses the dollars,” Norton said, but added that most people with EBT cards are using their benefits responsibly.
TANF is a federally funded program that replaced the Aid to Families With Dependent Children program as part of the Clinton administration’s welfare reform in the early 1990s. It provides financial assistance to help keep children in their homes.
EBT cards were initiated in Maine in 2003 and in several other states since the late 1990s as a means to reduce Food Stamp abuses. Currently, 78,354 Maine residents receive Food Stamps and 13,733 receive TANF. That figure is down from 23,246 in 1993, an indication that the TANF program is successful, according to Norton.
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