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AUGUST 21, 2010
HEAP Summer Crisis Program wraps up end of August
Up to $175 still available for eligible households From the Ohio Department of Development – Ohio Department of Development Director Lisa Patt-McDaniel wants to remind Ohioans who are elderly or have health problems that funding to assist eligible households with summer cooling costs through the Home Energy Assistance Program (HEAP) Summer Crisis Program is available through August 31, 2010. "With temperatures consistently in the 90s this week, I want to take this opportunity to encourage eligible families to apply for the Summer Crisis Program," Patt-McDaniel said. "The program is designed to keep our most vulnerable citizens safe and healthy during these hot summer months, and we don't want people to miss out on the help available to them." So far this summer, 34,138 households have been approved for assistance through the Summer Crisis Program. Out of $6.4 million available, $4.9 million has been obligated to assist households with their cooling bills.
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AUGUST 12, 2010
TracFone rates worry poverty groups
Lawyers want to see data on fees for going over free minutesThe following article by Tim Feran appeared August 9, 2010 in The Columbus Dispatch. Read below or view the contents on the Dispatch website.
Low-income telephone customers who use the state-subsidized Lifeline cell-phone service might be getting gouged by prepaid wireless phone provider TracFone, poverty law advocates fear. Under the program in question, TracFone Wireless Inc.'s SafeLink service, qualifying Ohioans can get a free cell phone with 68 free minutes to use each month. Once the free time is used, customers are charged 20 cents a minute. Although that price is roughly the same as what TracFone charges the public under at least one service plan, two groups consider the additional cost excessive. Lawyers for Ohio Poverty Law Center and Advocates for Basic Legal Equality Inc./Western Ohio filed a public-records request with the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio last week to find out how many people exceed the 68 minutes and by how much.
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JULY 27, 2010Response to DDN Editorial (July 27)In response to Sunday, July 25, 2010 Dayton Daily News editorial "Baby Vanessa Needs a Parent."
The legal case you referred to in "Baby Vanessa Needs a Parent" is both difficult and heart-breaking. Mr. Mills from the start has sought a remedy for this case through the judicial system that would recognize his relationship as his child’s father and place her in a good home in Dayton. As you note in your editorial, "Mr. Mills has done all the right things to protect his rights" and it is "not Mr. Mills' fault that this case has dragged on for so long..." |
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JULY 26, 2010The following editorial appeared in the Dayton Daily News (DDN) Sunday, July 25, 2010. View the contents here, or read on the DDN website.
Editorial: 'Baby Vanessa' needs a parentBy the Dayton Daily News | Sunday, July 25, 2010, 12:00 AM There isn't a judge in his or her right mind who is going to give Benjamin Mills Jr. his biological daughter, a 2-year-old named Vanessa who has spent her entire short life with a California woman who's trying to adopt her. But the process of formally getting to a decision is making the courts and other authorities appear as if they've lost their minds. |
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