Welfare to kids of illegals at $276 million

Since 05-03-06

BY TROY ANDERSON, Staff Writer

04/26/2006

http://www.dailynews.com/portlet/article/html/fragments/print_article.jsp?article=3751199

Los Angeles County Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich said Tuesday that he will tell Congress that close to 100,000 children of illegal immigrants in the county collect $276 million in annual welfare benefits.

Antonovich, who is in Washington with the Board of Supervisors, will meet with congressional representatives and provide information about the impact of illegal immigration on county services.

Antonovich said 98,703 children of 57,458 undocumented parents received Cal-WORKS welfare checks in January, or a total of 156,161 recipients.

"If incorporated into a city, it would be the sixth-largest city in Los Angeles County," Antonovich said in a statement Tuesday. "While legal immigration is a positive influence on our culture and economy ... in public safety, health care and public social services, illegals cost county taxpayers nearly three quarters of a billion dollars a year."

Shirley Christensen, spokeswoman for the Department of Public Social Services, said her office provided the data to Antonovich.

"What I want to make clear is the children we aid are legally eligible to be aided," Christensen said. "They are the children of undocumented parents, but they themselves are not undocumented. They were born in this country."

Antonovich's comments come amid a debate in Congress and across the nation about illegal immigration.

No reliable studies have been conducted on the economic impact illegal immigrants have on California government budgets, according to a study by the Public Policy Institute of California.

In 2004, the Government Accountability Office concluded there was insufficient information to establish the costs to states of educating illegal immigrant children.

Some in the immigration debate say illegal immigrants are a drain on public coffers. Others say illegal immigrants pay more in taxes than they receive in services.

Illegal immigrants are not eligible for many government services, but they can use the public health care system and their U.S.-born children are eligible for welfare.