#kentucky rural housing income limits

[kentuckybats]

2024 Kentucky USDA Loan Income Limits for Kentucky Counties  Kentucky USDA loan income limits vary by location and household size 

Kentucky USDA Rural Housing County Income Limits for 2024

[orbemnews]

Biden Team Preparing Up to $3 Trillion in New Spending for the Economy WASHINGTON — President Biden’s economic advisers are preparing to recommend spending as much as $3 trillion on a sweeping set of efforts aimed at boosting the economy, reducing carbon emissions and narrowing economic inequality, beginning with a giant infrastructure plan that may be financed in part through tax increases on corporations and the rich. After months of internal debate, Mr. Biden’s advisers are expected to present a proposal to the president this week that recommends carving his economic agenda into separate legislative pieces, rather than trying to push a mammoth package through Congress, according to people familiar with the plans and documents obtained by The New York Times. The total new spending in the plans would likely be $3 trillion, a person familiar with them said. That figure does not include the cost of extending new temporary tax cuts meant to fight poverty, which could reach hundreds of billions of dollars, according to estimates prepared by administration officials. Officials have not yet determined the exact breakdown in cost between the two packages. Mr. Biden supports all of the individual spending and tax cut proposals under consideration, but it is unclear whether he will back splitting his agenda into pieces, or what legislative strategy he and Democratic leaders will pursue to maximize the chances of pushing the new programs through Congress given their narrow majorities in both chambers. Administration officials caution that details of the spending programs remain in flux. But the scope of the proposal under consideration highlights the aggressive approach the Biden administration wants to take as it tries to harness the power of the federal government to narrow economic inequality, reduce the carbon emissions that drive climate change and improve American manufacturing and high-technology industries in an escalating battle with China and other foreign competitors. While the $1.9 trillion economic aid package that Mr. Biden signed into law earlier this month includes money to help vulnerable people and businesses survive until the pandemic ends, it does little to advance the longer-term economic agenda that Mr. Biden campaigned on. The package under consideration would begin that effort in earnest. The first legislative piece under discussion, which some Biden officials consider more appealing to Republicans, business leaders and many moderate Senate Democrats, would combine investments in manufacturing and advanced industries with what would be the most aggressive spending yet by the United States to reduce carbon emissions and combat climate change. It would spend heavily on infrastructure improvements, clean energy deployment and the development of other “high-growth industries of the future” like 5G telecommunications. It includes money for rural broadband, advanced training for millions of workers and 1 million affordable and energy-efficient housing units. Documents suggest it will include nearly $1 trillion in spending alone on the construction of roads, bridges, rail lines, ports, electric vehicle charging stations and improvements to the electric grid and other parts of the power sector. Whether it can muster Republican support will depend in large part on how the bill is paid for. Officials have discussed offsetting some or all of the infrastructure spending by raising taxes on corporations, including increasing the corporate income tax rate above the current 21 percent rate and a variety of measures to force multinational corporations to pay more tax in the United States on income they earn abroad. That strategy is unlikely to garner Republican votes. “I don’t think there’s going to be any enthusiasm on our side for a tax increase,” Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, told reporters last week. He predicted the administration’s infrastructure plan would be a “Trojan horse” for tax increases. Mr. Biden’s team has debated the merits of aggressively pursuing compromise with Republicans and business leaders on an infrastructure package, which would most likely require dropping or scaling back plans to raise taxes on corporations, or preparing to move another sweeping bill through a special parliamentary process that would require only Democratic votes. Mr. Biden’s advisers plan to present the proposal to congressional leaders this week. “President Biden and his team are considering a range of potential options for how to invest in working families and reform our tax code so it rewards work, not wealth,” Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, said. “Those conversations are ongoing, so any speculation about future economic proposals is premature and not a reflection of the White House’s thinking.��� Mr. Biden said in January that his relief bill would be followed by a “Build Back Better Recovery Plan,” echoing the language of his campaign agenda. He said that plan would “make historic investments in infrastructure and manufacturing, innovation, research and development, and clean energy. Investments in the caregiving economy and in skills and training needed by our workers to compete and win the global economy of the future.” The timing of that proposal — which Mr. Biden initially had said would come in February — slipped as administration officials focused on completing the relief package. In the interim, administration officials have concluded their best chance to advance Mr. Biden’s larger agenda in Congress will be to split “Build Back Better” into component proposals. The first plan, centered on infrastructure, includes large portions of the plan Mr. Biden offered in the 2020 election. His campaign predicted that Mr. Biden’s investments would create 5 million new jobs in manufacturing and advanced industries, on top of restoring all the jobs lost last year in the Covid-19 crisis. The second plan under discussion is focused on what many progressives call the nation’s human infrastructure — students, workers and people left on the sidelines of the job market — according to documents and people familiar with the discussions. It would spend heavily on education and on programs meant to increase the participation of women in the labor force, by helping them balance work and caregiving. It includes free community college, universal pre-K education, a national paid leave program and efforts to reduce child care costs. That plan would also make permanent two temporary provisions of Mr. Biden’s recent relief bill: expanded subsidies for low- and middle-income Americans to buy health insurance and tax credits aimed at cutting poverty, particularly for children. How Has the Pandemic Changed Your Taxes? Will stimulus payments be taxed? Nope. The so-called economic impact payments are not treated as income. In fact, they’re technically an advance on a tax credit, known as the Recovery Rebate Credit. The payments could indirectly affect what you pay in state income taxes in a handful of states, where federal tax is deductible against state taxable income, as our colleague Ann Carrns wrote. Read more. Are my unemployment benefits taxable? Mostly.  Unemployment insurance is generally subject to federal as well as state income tax, though there are exceptions (Nine states don’t impose their own income taxes, and another six exempt unemployment payments from taxation, according to the Tax Foundation). But you won’t owe so-called payroll taxes, which pay for Social Security and Medicare. The new relief bill will make the first $10,200 of benefits tax-free if your income is less than $150,000. This applies to 2020 only. (If you’ve already filed your taxes, watch for I.R.S. guidance.) Unlike paychecks from an employer, taxes for unemployment aren’t automatically withheld. Recipients must opt in — and even when they do, federal taxes are withheld only at a flat rate of 10 percent of benefits. While the new tax break will provide a cushion, some people could still owe the I.R.S. or certain states money. Read more. I worked from home this year. Can I take the home office deduction? Probably not, unless you’re self-employed, an independent contractor or a gig worker. The tax law overhaul of late 2019 eliminated the home office deduction for employees from 2018 through 2025. “Employees who receive a paycheck or a W-2 exclusively from an employer are not eligible for the deduction, even if they are currently working from home,” the I.R.S. said. Read more. How does the family leave credit work? Self-employed people can take paid caregiving leave if their child’s school is closed or their usual child care provider is unavailable because of the outbreak. This works similarly to the smaller sick leave credit — 67 percent of average daily earnings (for either 2020 or 2019), up to $200 a day. But the caregiving leave can be taken for 50 days. Read more. Have rules changed on charitable giving? Yes. This year, you can deduct up to $300 for charitable contributions, even if you use the standard deduction. Previously, only people who itemized could claim these deductions. Donations must be made in cash (for these purposes, this includes check, credit card or debit card), and can’t include securities, household items or other property. For 2021, the deduction limit will double to $600 for joint filers. Rules for itemizers became more generous as well. The limit on charitable donations has been suspended, so individuals can contribute up to 100 percent of their adjusted gross income, up from 60 percent. But these donations must be made to public charities in cash; the old rules apply to contributions made to donor-advised funds, for example. Both provisions are available through 2021. Read more. Officials have weighed financing that plan through initiatives that would reduce federal spending by as much as $700 billion over a decade, like allowing Medicare to negotiate prescription drug costs with pharmaceutical companies. The officials have discussed further offsetting the spending increases by raising taxes on high-earning individuals and households, like raising the top marginal income tax rate to 39.6 percent from 37 percent. Administration officials were still debating details of the tax increases late last week. One question is how, exactly, to apply Mr. Biden’s campaign promise that no one earning less than $400,000 a year would pay more in federal taxes under his plan. Currently, the top marginal income tax rate starts at just above $500,000 for individuals and above $600,000 for couples. Mr. Biden proposed raising that rate in the campaign. Officials say they are committed to not raising the tax bills of any individual earning less than $400,000. But they have debated whether to lower the income threshold for the top marginal rate, to tax all individual income above $400,000 at 39.6 percent, in order to raise more revenue for his spending plans. Mr. Biden’s broader economic agenda will face a more difficult road in Congress than his relief bill, which was financed entirely by federal borrowing and passed using a special parliamentary tactic with only Democratic votes. Mr. Biden could again attempt to use that same budget reconciliation process to pass a bill on party lines. But moderate Democrats in the Senate have insisted that the president engage Republicans on the next wave of economic legislation, and that the new spending be offset by tax increases. Large business groups and some congressional Republicans have expressed support for some of Mr. Biden’s broad goals, most notably efforts to rebuild roads, bridges, water and sewer systems and other infrastructure across the country. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and National Association of Manufacturers have both spoken favorably of spending up to $2 trillion on infrastructure this year. But Republicans are united in opposition to most of the tax increases Mr. Biden has proposed. Business groups have warned that corporate tax increases would scuttle their support for an infrastructure plan. “That’s the kind of thing that can just wreck the competitiveness in a country,” Aric Newhouse, senior vice president of policy and government relations at the National Association of Manufacturers, said last month. Administration officials are considering offering to extend some parts of Mr. Trump’s tax law that are set to expire, like the ability to immediately deduct new investments, as part of their plans in order to win over business support. Top business groups have also expressed an openness to Mr. Biden breaking up his “Build Back Better” agenda in order to pass smaller pieces with bipartisan support. “If you try to solve every major issue in one bill, I don’t know that’s a recipe for success,” Neil Bradley, executive vice president and chief policy officer at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said in an interview last month. “These don’t have to be done in one package.” Source link Orbem News #Biden #Economy #Preparing #Spending #team #TRILLION

[easyfoodnetwork]

Dispatches From Food Service Workers Across the U.S.: ‘I’m Trying Not to Panic’

Shutterstock/Kondor83

Restaurant employees from Kentucky, North Dakota, New York, Oregon, and Minnesota share their stories

Last week, President Trump formed the Economic Revival Industry Group, a collection of 200 experts and industry leaders to inform the (possibly ill-advised) campaign to re-open the economy. The group, focused on restaurants, included numerous chain CEOs and celebrity chef-owners like Wolfgang Puck and Thomas Keller. And though the latter could hardly be expected to advocate for the needs of restaurant owners whose restaurants don’t have Michelin stars, there is another group notably absent from the committee: restaurant workers.

Independent restaurant owners are struggling with the realities and uncertainties of life in a pandemic, whether it’s having to lay off employees or trying to keep people paid as the business pivots to take-out only. But for your average food service worker — servers, bartenders, line cooks, and baristas — there is even less support. Restaurant employees made up 60 percent of the jobs lost in March. Twenty-two million people filed for unemployment in the past four weeks, leaving unemployment websites overwhelmed. The Paycheck Protection Program, which offers federal loans in exchange for keeping employees on payroll, is out of money. All this adds up to millions of food service workers being left without a paycheck.

Despite Trump’s plans, no one knows what the restaurant industry is going to look like on the other side of the pandemic. And so workers wait, hoping their restaurants will reopen, hoping they or their coworkers will be rehired, hoping there will be a workplace to come back to. As chains and fine-dining chefs are the only ones with access to the White House, it’s important to remember their experiences do not represent the restaurant industry as a whole. Whether or not restaurant workers, not merely restaurateurs, feel supported will be the true test of any government program’s success. With that in mind, we spoke to five restaurant workers across the country on what they’re experiencing right now. These are stories in their own words, edited lightly for clarity.

Gregg Adams, line cook at J Harrods, Louisville, Kentucky

The chef and I are the only kitchen staff left of four full-time and two part-timers. He takes a salary, I am on reduced hours, which means less money to repair the house and cars, much less save anything. Since this began we have been steadily losing customers. Our food isn’t geared for takeout, though we changed the menu some. Also, we made a lot of our money through drinks. Initially, the state only allowed the sale of closed alcohol containers, and some restaurants started selling flight bottles and half pints with soda or cup mixer on the side. Within a week, open alcohol sales were allowed rather than just packaged liquor, but it was too late for those who followed the rules.

I’m hanging in there, but I’m lucky. Not much has changed for me and my family. My wife is on medical disability with fixed income and doesn’t leave the house much. My teenager already practiced social distancing. My 26-year-old is working 60 hours a week at a local coffee chain. My 25-year-old works for UPS. I’m blessed to have employment. I know three other cooks and two chefs who are unemployed. But I can’t plan anything for anything now. I’m wondering about my concert tickets and my child’s education if my older children will get sick, and what my options are in general. I’m trying to not panic.

Massoud Violette-Sheikh, sous chef at the Heights, Ithaca, New York

I am 23 years old and have been working in the industry for five years, starting as a dishwasher at the Heights. My start in the industry was mainly out of necessity — dishwashing offered good hours and the possibility of upward mobility in the restaurant. But the work ethic and our local food community was contagious; I wouldn’t want to be in any other industry, even in these times. I rose to sous this past year. In an area where we are financially dependent on Ithaca College and Cornell as our main contributors to economic stimulation, this has train-wrecked the local economy.

At the Heights, all staff with the exception of our chef de cuisine have been temporarily let go. I think the post-pandemic dining landscape is going to be entirely different — staff cuts, wage cuts, and mandatory seating reduction will absolutely affect how we are able to eat. Even the most luxurious restaurants will have to cut back on menus, garnishes, and available reservations. I’m hopeful that diners will come out in droves after restaurants open up, but realistically that’s not likely. The social habits that we develop will linger. I spend a lot of time talking with my close friends and coworkers. Everyone just wants to be back in the kitchen — to be back home. As an individual I’m grateful for private grants such as the Restaurant Employee Relief Fund — programs like that are going to be our saviors. But our primary concern is how long our local independent restaurants, farms, and purveyors will be able to stay open. The debt to equity ratio in our industry is very high, and I expect to see places sink into irreversible debt. I hope customers will be patient as we get back on our feet; without their support, all that will be left is Chili’s and McDonald’s.

Marlena Chaboudy, cook at A Frame Bar & Grill, Westhope, North Dakota

Busy season is the beginning of spring through the end of summer. We are situated on Lake Metigoshe, and when the snow melts people start moving in their boats and readying their docks to enjoy their summer. We were all gearing up for that when the spread of the virus hit hard and hours were cut. Our place was then shut down for dine-in service and we tried to stay positive. I found out the secret was really not to make eye contact, because if I saw one of us start to tear up, it opened the floodgates for me.

I’m behind in rent, my vehicle is in need of a few repairs. I had planned on moving closer to work — I live about 40 miles away — and found a place, but will have to come by money for the utility and house deposits and rent in order to do so. My fiancé and I live together, and he also works at the A-Frame as a dishwasher. He has filed for unemployment but has a limited work history and hasn’t paid in enough in the quarters to draw unemployment. And he won’t get the one-sum stimulus check either, and that’s going to hurt. Living in a rural community, you can’t count on anything for relief. You can’t count on the small town store to get a delivery truck, or go to the store the same day and be able to buy a roll of toilet paper or a dozen eggs. I can’t guarantee that my internet will be functional much less my phone service, and trying to even access the unemployment website can take all day. You go to the gas station for a treat and you never know if they are open because if they haven’t had enough business that day to justify keeping the lights on, or paying an employee to sit there, they close early.

I don’t think the aid the government is giving is enough. Not at all! It’s getting bad everywhere. The people in the foodservice industry are the “blue collar” workers that everyone forgets about. We are not paid as much as the blue collar norm and making ends meet isn’t looking possible for most.

Rae Bullinger, former front of house at Rise Bagels, Minneapolis

We closed our dining room around March 16th, but kept our online and takeout phone ordering systems the same. After closing the dining room, it was fairly slow that first week, but we kept advertising the online and pick-up ordering and by the weekend our system just couldn’t keep up. On my weekend shift, we were so overwhelmed with online orders overnight that we actually had to turn the first customers away, because we were still trying to catch up with the online orders. The next day is when the owners decided to temporarily close. Before coronavirus, we had a good sense of how many bagels we needed each day of the week to fill our normal amount of orders. Once we started advertising more about online and phone ordering mid-March, our demand shifted to a point we couldn’t have predicted.

Before I started my job at Rise Bagel, I was a graduate student in the psychology field. I had to take a leave of absence in October due to an inpatient stay for my mental health, and decided to put school on pause and pursue a new career in food sustainability. I thought getting my foot in the door at a local restaurant that focuses on local, organic ingredients and sustainable practices would provide me with some great insight. The job finally gave me a sense of purpose and control when I hadn’t had that in a long time. However, when we suddenly had to close, it was like my sense of purpose also disappeared. My job was the one thing that kept me feeling certain about my future. Uncertainty about my future at Rise has led to an increase in my anxiety around leaving school and my future career. I have many fears of having to start all over again, and it’s hard to stay motivated when I can’t gain restaurant experience from my home.

Here in Minnesota, individual unemployment benefits are only given if you had made $3,000 or more before unemployment. Because I was in graduate school and had only been at my job at Rise for a few months, I did not meet this requirement and will not be receiving any unemployment benefits. For those making minimum wage (aka many of those in the food service industry), prerequisites like this may have some major impacts. I’m incredibly thankful to be living at home during this time with great support, but I couldn’t imagine being in a more dire situation and then denied benefits based on something I may not have had control over. I’m really glad something is being done for small business owners, but what really matters is what happens after this. A restaurant will only survive if better legislation is passed and people continue to visit even after social distancing orders are lifted. The attention and support food service employees and places are getting right now is amazing, but systematic change needs to occur for them to continue to survive.

Ashton Long, bartender, Portland, Oregon

We were all in an especially odd situation because we had just all been through training and had opened the restaurant, Bar King, to the public Monday, March 9th. Our restaurant closed down to the public on March 15th and began only providing takeout orders. Luckily, right now it is looking like we’ll be opening back up and all have our jobs back, but when? I don’t think anyone has even a clue. And that is terrifying.

My partner and I moved here in early January of this year. Luckily, he works from home, but I set out to find a job as soon as I got here, and even with my experience and my resume, it took me nearly two months to find something because of how competitive the service industry staffing is in Portland. I exhausted nearly all of my savings and threw all of my faith into the fact that I’d find a job when I got here, and then I worked for literally two weeks and then lost my job. I don’t remember a time in my life where I didn’t have two jobs and work anywhere from 40 to 70 hours a week, so having this much free time, and on such an incredibly STRICT budget of one income, has been extremely challenging to fill.

While I think the stimulus money is great, and quite literally a life saver for many — including me — unemployment has been a literal shit show and a nightmare to deal with. I still have yet to see any benefits or correspondence from either Michigan or Oregon to figure out what I need to do in this situation where I lived and worked in Michigan last year and Oregon now. While I do understand that having 2.2 MILLION people sign up for unemployment in the last month is overwhelming, if it weren’t for the stimulus check and my partner, I could very well be on my way back to Michigan right now to live with family. And as a 25-year-old who has never had to consider an option like that because I’ve always had work and savings, that is a horrifying and scary scenario.

If you’re a food service worker, Eater wants to hear your story. Please fill out this survey.

from Eater - All https://ift.tt/3cz9Lic https://ift.tt/2KmWSfe

Shutterstock/Kondor83

Restaurant employees from Kentucky, North Dakota, New York, Oregon, and Minnesota share their stories

Last week, President Trump formed the Economic Revival Industry Group, a collection of 200 experts and industry leaders to inform the (possibly ill-advised) campaign to re-open the economy. The group, focused on restaurants, included numerous chain CEOs and celebrity chef-owners like Wolfgang Puck and Thomas Keller. And though the latter could hardly be expected to advocate for the needs of restaurant owners whose restaurants don’t have Michelin stars, there is another group notably absent from the committee: restaurant workers.

Independent restaurant owners are struggling with the realities and uncertainties of life in a pandemic, whether it’s having to lay off employees or trying to keep people paid as the business pivots to take-out only. But for your average food service worker — servers, bartenders, line cooks, and baristas — there is even less support. Restaurant employees made up 60 percent of the jobs lost in March. Twenty-two million people filed for unemployment in the past four weeks, leaving unemployment websites overwhelmed. The Paycheck Protection Program, which offers federal loans in exchange for keeping employees on payroll, is out of money. All this adds up to millions of food service workers being left without a paycheck.

Despite Trump’s plans, no one knows what the restaurant industry is going to look like on the other side of the pandemic. And so workers wait, hoping their restaurants will reopen, hoping they or their coworkers will be rehired, hoping there will be a workplace to come back to. As chains and fine-dining chefs are the only ones with access to the White House, it’s important to remember their experiences do not represent the restaurant industry as a whole. Whether or not restaurant workers, not merely restaurateurs, feel supported will be the true test of any government program’s success. With that in mind, we spoke to five restaurant workers across the country on what they’re experiencing right now. These are stories in their own words, edited lightly for clarity.

Gregg Adams, line cook at J Harrods, Louisville, Kentucky

The chef and I are the only kitchen staff left of four full-time and two part-timers. He takes a salary, I am on reduced hours, which means less money to repair the house and cars, much less save anything. Since this began we have been steadily losing customers. Our food isn’t geared for takeout, though we changed the menu some. Also, we made a lot of our money through drinks. Initially, the state only allowed the sale of closed alcohol containers, and some restaurants started selling flight bottles and half pints with soda or cup mixer on the side. Within a week, open alcohol sales were allowed rather than just packaged liquor, but it was too late for those who followed the rules.

I’m hanging in there, but I’m lucky. Not much has changed for me and my family. My wife is on medical disability with fixed income and doesn’t leave the house much. My teenager already practiced social distancing. My 26-year-old is working 60 hours a week at a local coffee chain. My 25-year-old works for UPS. I’m blessed to have employment. I know three other cooks and two chefs who are unemployed. But I can’t plan anything for anything now. I’m wondering about my concert tickets and my child’s education if my older children will get sick, and what my options are in general. I’m trying to not panic.

Massoud Violette-Sheikh, sous chef at the Heights, Ithaca, New York

I am 23 years old and have been working in the industry for five years, starting as a dishwasher at the Heights. My start in the industry was mainly out of necessity — dishwashing offered good hours and the possibility of upward mobility in the restaurant. But the work ethic and our local food community was contagious; I wouldn’t want to be in any other industry, even in these times. I rose to sous this past year. In an area where we are financially dependent on Ithaca College and Cornell as our main contributors to economic stimulation, this has train-wrecked the local economy.

At the Heights, all staff with the exception of our chef de cuisine have been temporarily let go. I think the post-pandemic dining landscape is going to be entirely different — staff cuts, wage cuts, and mandatory seating reduction will absolutely affect how we are able to eat. Even the most luxurious restaurants will have to cut back on menus, garnishes, and available reservations. I’m hopeful that diners will come out in droves after restaurants open up, but realistically that’s not likely. The social habits that we develop will linger. I spend a lot of time talking with my close friends and coworkers. Everyone just wants to be back in the kitchen — to be back home. As an individual I’m grateful for private grants such as the Restaurant Employee Relief Fund — programs like that are going to be our saviors. But our primary concern is how long our local independent restaurants, farms, and purveyors will be able to stay open. The debt to equity ratio in our industry is very high, and I expect to see places sink into irreversible debt. I hope customers will be patient as we get back on our feet; without their support, all that will be left is Chili’s and McDonald’s.

Marlena Chaboudy, cook at A Frame Bar & Grill, Westhope, North Dakota

Busy season is the beginning of spring through the end of summer. We are situated on Lake Metigoshe, and when the snow melts people start moving in their boats and readying their docks to enjoy their summer. We were all gearing up for that when the spread of the virus hit hard and hours were cut. Our place was then shut down for dine-in service and we tried to stay positive. I found out the secret was really not to make eye contact, because if I saw one of us start to tear up, it opened the floodgates for me.

I’m behind in rent, my vehicle is in need of a few repairs. I had planned on moving closer to work — I live about 40 miles away — and found a place, but will have to come by money for the utility and house deposits and rent in order to do so. My fiancé and I live together, and he also works at the A-Frame as a dishwasher. He has filed for unemployment but has a limited work history and hasn’t paid in enough in the quarters to draw unemployment. And he won’t get the one-sum stimulus check either, and that’s going to hurt. Living in a rural community, you can’t count on anything for relief. You can’t count on the small town store to get a delivery truck, or go to the store the same day and be able to buy a roll of toilet paper or a dozen eggs. I can��t guarantee that my internet will be functional much less my phone service, and trying to even access the unemployment website can take all day. You go to the gas station for a treat and you never know if they are open because if they haven’t had enough business that day to justify keeping the lights on, or paying an employee to sit there, they close early.

I don’t think the aid the government is giving is enough. Not at all! It’s getting bad everywhere. The people in the foodservice industry are the “blue collar” workers that everyone forgets about. We are not paid as much as the blue collar norm and making ends meet isn’t looking possible for most.

Rae Bullinger, former front of house at Rise Bagels, Minneapolis

We closed our dining room around March 16th, but kept our online and takeout phone ordering systems the same. After closing the dining room, it was fairly slow that first week, but we kept advertising the online and pick-up ordering and by the weekend our system just couldn’t keep up. On my weekend shift, we were so overwhelmed with online orders overnight that we actually had to turn the first customers away, because we were still trying to catch up with the online orders. The next day is when the owners decided to temporarily close. Before coronavirus, we had a good sense of how many bagels we needed each day of the week to fill our normal amount of orders. Once we started advertising more about online and phone ordering mid-March, our demand shifted to a point we couldn’t have predicted.

Before I started my job at Rise Bagel, I was a graduate student in the psychology field. I had to take a leave of absence in October due to an inpatient stay for my mental health, and decided to put school on pause and pursue a new career in food sustainability. I thought getting my foot in the door at a local restaurant that focuses on local, organic ingredients and sustainable practices would provide me with some great insight. The job finally gave me a sense of purpose and control when I hadn’t had that in a long time. However, when we suddenly had to close, it was like my sense of purpose also disappeared. My job was the one thing that kept me feeling certain about my future. Uncertainty about my future at Rise has led to an increase in my anxiety around leaving school and my future career. I have many fears of having to start all over again, and it’s hard to stay motivated when I can’t gain restaurant experience from my home.

Here in Minnesota, individual unemployment benefits are only given if you had made $3,000 or more before unemployment. Because I was in graduate school and had only been at my job at Rise for a few months, I did not meet this requirement and will not be receiving any unemployment benefits. For those making minimum wage (aka many of those in the food service industry), prerequisites like this may have some major impacts. I’m incredibly thankful to be living at home during this time with great support, but I couldn’t imagine being in a more dire situation and then denied benefits based on something I may not have had control over. I’m really glad something is being done for small business owners, but what really matters is what happens after this. A restaurant will only survive if better legislation is passed and people continue to visit even after social distancing orders are lifted. The attention and support food service employees and places are getting right now is amazing, but systematic change needs to occur for them to continue to survive.

Ashton Long, bartender, Portland, Oregon

We were all in an especially odd situation because we had just all been through training and had opened the restaurant, Bar King, to the public Monday, March 9th. Our restaurant closed down to the public on March 15th and began only providing takeout orders. Luckily, right now it is looking like we’ll be opening back up and all have our jobs back, but when? I don’t think anyone has even a clue. And that is terrifying.

My partner and I moved here in early January of this year. Luckily, he works from home, but I set out to find a job as soon as I got here, and even with my experience and my resume, it took me nearly two months to find something because of how competitive the service industry staffing is in Portland. I exhausted nearly all of my savings and threw all of my faith into the fact that I’d find a job when I got here, and then I worked for literally two weeks and then lost my job. I don’t remember a time in my life where I didn’t have two jobs and work anywhere from 40 to 70 hours a week, so having this much free time, and on such an incredibly STRICT budget of one income, has been extremely challenging to fill.

While I think the stimulus money is great, and quite literally a life saver for many — including me — unemployment has been a literal shit show and a nightmare to deal with. I still have yet to see any benefits or correspondence from either Michigan or Oregon to figure out what I need to do in this situation where I lived and worked in Michigan last year and Oregon now. While I do understand that having 2.2 MILLION people sign up for unemployment in the last month is overwhelming, if it weren’t for the stimulus check and my partner, I could very well be on my way back to Michigan right now to live with family. And as a 25-year-old who has never had to consider an option like that because I’ve always had work and savings, that is a horrifying and scary scenario.

If you’re a food service worker, Eater wants to hear your story. Please fill out this survey.

from Eater - All https://ift.tt/3cz9Lic via Blogger https://ift.tt/2xPCMrm

[bigyack-com]

Aging, Rising, Brainy, Booming: Super Tuesday Economies Pose Wider Test

The first few contests in the Democratic presidential primary race have been fought in states that are small and somewhat quirky economically. There aren’t many states where voters care as much about ethanol subsidies as they do in Iowa, or where culinary unions wield as much power as in Nevada.All of that will change on Super Tuesday. The 14 states voting make up nearly 40 percent of the population, and an even larger share of gross domestic product, with all the demographic and economic diversity those numbers suggest.Tuesday’s results, therefore, could give us our first hard data on how the economy is affecting the Democratic race. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont has moved to the front of the pack by emphasizing his plans to tackle income inequality — will that message resonate more in places where more families are struggling? Michael R. Bloomberg, the billionaire former New York City mayor, has stressed his management experience — will that play better in wealthier, more highly educated places?Fourteen states are a lot to keep track of. So we’ve broken them into four categories based on their long-term economic strength (represented in the chart above by their median household income) and their more recent performance (their job growth since the start of the Trump administration).No such grouping is perfect, of course. And states are diverse places — even the richest ones have pockets of poverty. Still, if you keep these groups in mind as the results roll in, you should get a sense of how economic issues are playing out in the primary campaign.

Group 1: Going Gray

Super Tuesday states: Maine, VermontSimilar states: Kentucky, Pennsylvania, West VirginiaThere isn’t much doubt about who will win Vermont, Mr. Sanders’s home state. But these states, characterized by relatively low incomes and slow job growth, nonetheless reflect challenges facing a substantial part of the country.At a time when economic activity is increasingly concentrated in cities, these states are predominantly rural: Maine and Vermont ranked first and second in the 2010 census in the share of their populations living outside metropolitan areas. At a time when the aging population is a concern nationwide because of rising health care costs and shrinking labor forces, these states are already old: 20.6 percent Mainers were 65 or older in 2019, a slightly higher share even than in Florida. (Vermont came in fourth at 19.4 percent.) And at a time when slowing immigration and low birthrates are limiting population growth, these states are already growing slowly or, in the case of Vermont, shrinking.Maine and Vermont are (nearly) neighbors, but these issues transcend geography. Indeed, in terms of their economies, these states share less in common with the rest of New England than with Appalachian states like West Virginia and Kentucky and with Midwestern industrial states like Ohio and Wisconsin.

Group 2: The Rising Sun Belt

Super Tuesday states: Alabama, Arkansas, North Carolina, Oklahoma, TennesseeSimilar states: New Mexico, South CarolinaThese states are no richer, on average, than the states in the group above. But unlike Maine and Vermont, they have had relatively robust job growth in recent years, and their economic growth has been stronger as well.These states are mostly in the South and Southwest, and while they are hardly homogeneous, they share certain advantages including a low cost of living and growing (and comparatively youthful) populations.But they also face challenges, including low rates of college education (North Carolina is an exception) and relatively heavy exposure to the manufacturing sector, which has been struggling recently. And while Raleigh, Charlotte and Nashville are magnets for young graduates and the companies that want to employ them, few other cities in this group fit that description. That raises questions about how well positioned these states are to keep growing in an increasingly technology-driven economy.

Group 3: Brain Power

Super Tuesday states: Massachusetts, Minnesota, VirginiaSimilar states: Illinois, Maryland, New YorkThis group includes many East Coast states that are traditionally economic powerhouses — but that haven’t looked much like ones in recent years.Over the long term, these states have a lot going for them. They are generally affluent and well educated, have world-renowned hospitals and universities and contain some of the country’s largest and most vibrant urban areas. They have diversified economies that don’t rely too heavily on manufacturing. Those assets helped them weather the last recession better than many other states.But job growth in this group has been relatively weak under Mr. Trump, and their broader economic growth has also lagged. High living costs are also taking a toll: Most of the states in this group, including the three voting on Tuesday, have seen a net outflow of residents to the rest of the country in recent years, although immigration has allowed their overall populations to keep growing.

Group 4: Modern Miracles

Super Tuesday states: California, Colorado, Texas, UtahSimilar states: Arizona, Oregon, WashingtonThese states have been the winners in the 21st-century economy. They are already affluent, yet are still adding jobs at an impressive clip, with many of the jobs coming in high-paying, fast-growing sectors like technology and health care. These states for the most part have young, diverse and fast-growing populations, with a large number of immigrants. They are the beneficiaries of a virtuous circle: Their thriving cities attract young college graduates and skilled workers, which attract the companies that want to employ them, which attract more workers drawn by job opportunities.But that kind of success brings challenges. California’s cities are dealing with a sky-high cost of living, nightmarish traffic jams and a full-blown housing crisis, leading some residents to abandon the state. Seattle, Denver and Salt Lake City are dealing with similar problems, albeit on a different scale.Outside their big metropolitan areas, these states are dealing with many of the same issues — aging populations, lackluster job growth — that states in other categories are facing. Elected officials, policymakers and nonprofit groups are struggling to ensure that their states’ economic success isn’t leaving lower-income areas and residents behind. Read the full article

[superkentuckyblr]

(via Kentucky USDA Loans | Rural Housing Loans Kentucky)

[kentuckybats]

2024 Kentucky USDA Loan Income Limits for Kentucky Counties  Kentucky USDA loan income limits vary by location and household size 

How to Qualify for a USDA Home Loan in Kentucky

[day0one]

As coronavirus testing expands, a new problem arises: Not enough people to test

Four months into the U.S. coronavirus outbreak, tests for the virus finally are becoming widely available, a crucial step toward lifting stay-at-home orders and safely returning to normal life. But while many states no longer report crippling supply shortages, a new problem has emerged: too few people lining up to get tested.

A Washington Post survey of governors’ offices and state health departments found at least a dozen states where testing capacity outstrips the supply of patients. Many have scrambled to make testing more convenient, especially for vulnerable communities, by setting up pop-up sites and developing apps that help assess symptoms, find free test sites and deliver quick results.

But the numbers, while rising, are well short of capacity — and far short of targets set by independent experts. Utah, for example, is conducting about 3,500 tests a day, a little more than a third of its 9,000-test maximum capacity, and health officials have erected highway billboards begging drivers to “GET TESTED FOR COVID-19.”

Subscribe to the Post Most newsletter: Today’s most popular stories on The Washington Post

Why aren’t more people showing up? “Well, that’s the million-dollar question,” said Utah Health Department spokesman Tom Hudachko. “It could be simply that people don’t want to be tested. It could be that people feel like they don’t need to be tested. It could be that people are so mildly symptomatic that they’re just not concerned that having a positive lab result would actually change their course in any meaningful way.”

Experts say several factors may be preventing more people from seeking tests, including a lingering sense of scarcity, a lack of access in rural and underserved communities, concerns about cost, and skepticism about testing operations.

“We know there’s a lack of trust in the African American community with the medical profession,” said Ala Stanford, a pediatric surgeon in Philadelphia who started a group to provide free testing in low-income and minority communities, which have been hit particularly hard by the virus. The effort, which offers testing in church parking lots, has serviced more than 3,000 people in recent weeks.

“You’ve got to meet people where they are,” Stanford said.

Another major hurdle: lingering confusion about who qualifies. In the earliest days of the outbreak, Americans were told that only the sickest and most vulnerable should get tested while others should stay home. Last month, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention relaxed its guidelines to offer tests to people without symptoms who are referred by local health departments or clinicians.

Some states have since relaxed their testing criteria dramatically. Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R) has encouraged “all Georgians, even if they are not experiencing symptoms, to schedule an appointment.” And Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt (R) urged residents earlier this month to “call 2-1-1 and find a location close to you, even if you don’t have symptoms and you’re just curious.”

Elsewhere, officials scarred by shortages have been hesitant to follow suit.

“A lot of states put in very, very restrictive testing policies . . . because they didn’t have any tests. And they’ve either not relaxed those, or the word is not getting out,” said Ashish Jha, who directs the Harvard Global Health Institute. “We want to be at a point where everybody who has mild symptoms is tested. That is critical. That is still not happening in a lot of places.”

Last week, Jha and other Harvard researchers estimated that the United States should be testing at least 900,000 people a day, or about 8 percent of the population per month. At that rate, they say, local officials would get a clear sense of the spread of the virus, would be able to detect clusters of infection in the early stages and could move to isolate people who test positive or have been exposed, a process known as contact tracing.

A White House estimate, obtained by The Post, shows the nation has sufficient lab capacity to process at least 400,000 tests per day, and potentially many more. But in surveying the states, The Post found that few are testing at full capacity. In 20 states that provided detailed information, the number of tests performed was roughly 235,000 per day lower than their technical capacity, with the biggest gaps in California and New Jersey.

Lab capacity remains untapped for many reasons, including lingering supply shortages. While most states say they are now able to test people in hospitals, nursing homes, prisons and other front-line settings, many continue to be hampered by a lack of personal protective equipment (PPE), nasal swabs and reagents, the chemicals necessary to process tests.

California, for example, has sufficient lab capacity to conduct nearly 100,000 tests a day, but is averaging fewer than 40,000. At a news conference last week, Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) cited continuing “supply-chain constraints.”

And in Chicago, a major chain of urgent-care clinics temporarily halted mobile testing last week when it ran out of test kits. “[W]e are currently unable to test for COVID-19 in Illinois,” said a message posted Sunday on the website of Physicians Immediate Care, adding that the chain hopes to resume testing Monday.

As states trying to encourage people to return to normal life ramp up testing, experts worry that widespread shortages could return.

“Right now, in some locations in this country, they don’t have adequate testing to test all symptomatic patients,” said Angela M. Caliendo, a board member of the Infectious Diseases Society of America and vice chair in the Department of Medicine at Alpert Medical School of Brown University. “So when you open up and you start testing people that are asymptomatic, you’re going to put a lot of pressure on the supply chain.”

The federal government is working to remedy the problem, including by investing $75.5 million through the Defense Production Act to increase swab production. The Food and Drug Administration has eased regulations to permit use of swabs made from polyester in addition to nylon and foam, and the Trump administration has pledged to supply 12.9 million swabs directly to states this month, a promise many governors are banking on.

Last week, President Trump announced that the federal government will distribute $11 billion to help states get additional supplies, part of a $25 billion testing budget approved by Congress.

“I said from the beginning that the federal government would back up the states and help them build their testing capability and capacities, and that’s exactly what’s happened,” he said.

But reagents remain a problem. In the District, health officials have access to a public health lab, a research lab and six hospital labs, which together have the capacity to process at least 3,700 tests per day, said LaQuandra Nesbitt, director of the D.C. Department of Health. But reagents must match the labs’ testing machines; in recent weeks, the labs have managed to purchase only enough to conduct 1,500 tests per day.

Still, even that supply has outstripped demand, with only about 1,000 D.C. residents seeking tests each day. In late April, the city expanded its guidelines to permit grocery store clerks and other critical workers to get tested regardless of whether they have symptoms. Further changes prioritized people over 65 and with underlying health conditions. Meanwhile, former first lady Michelle Obama has urged people in robocalls to take advantage of the free service.

Testing has been similarly slow to ramp up in Virginia, where guidelines posted on the state’s website limited testing mostly to people with symptoms who were hospitalized, living in communal settings or working as health-care providers.

Hilary Adams, a 28-year-old Web coordinator for the American Society of Clinical Oncology, said her doctor refused to order a test in late April even though she had a sore throat and headache, suffers from asthma and lives with her father, who had tested positive. She was told to stay home and quarantine.

“Just living with that level of uncertainty and anxiety was really, really stressful,” Adams said.

After being criticized for low testing rates, Virginia officials posted relaxed guidelines on May 5. That day, Adams’s doctor finally ordered a test — which came back negative. Virginia has since reported an increase in testing from about 4,000 per day to nearly 7,000.

“We’ve said from the very beginning that we needed more PPE. We have that now. Then we said we needed more testing supplies. We have that now,” said former Virginia health commissioner Karen Remley, who co-directs a testing task force appointed by Gov. Ralph Northam (D). “Now we’re working on education and bringing people to the table.”

A national strategy could make that effort more effective, said Danielle Allen, director of Harvard’s Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics, which last week published a $74 billion road map that calls for 24-hour contact tracing and isolation facilities for people who test positive. Although many states are building those services, the patchwork approach means scarce resources may not be efficiently deployed.

For example, inviting anyone to get tested, rather than focusing on hot spots or areas of high vulnerability, is “not going to be that valuable,” said Jan Malcolm, the health commissioner in Minnesota, where policymakers are building toward 20,000 tests per day and considering hiring more than 4,000 contact tracers.

Kentucky illustrates the transition many states are making. In the first few months of the pandemic, the state had major shortages of testing materials and had to send many samples out of state for processing. Then in March, Gov. Andy Beshear (D) tapped a pair of local lab companies to scale up operations.

Gravity Diagnostics, a 140-person firm in Covington, blew out a wall to expand its main lab and hired 15 more people. It has processed nearly 40 percent of all tests in the state, as well as tests conducted at Kroger mobile health clinics across the nation.

By last week, Beshear said Kentucky had secured all the components needed to further ramp up testing, including a significant supply of swabs from the federal government. With businesses starting to reopen, Beshear is urging everyone to get tested. The state recorded an average of 5,700 tests a day over the past week, a sharp uptick.

“We can provide all the capacity in the world,” Beshear said. “You’ve got to show up and take a test.”

The story is similar elsewhere. In Wisconsin, officials last week listed a daily capacity of 13,400 tests, spread across 52 labs. But daily reported tests have averaged only about 4,800. To bump up the numbers, Gov. Tony Evers (D) has ordered the National Guard to set up mobile testing sites and told doctors to test anyone with symptoms.

In Florida, tests are averaging about half the statewide capacity of 30,000 per day. Jared Moskowitz, director of Florida’s Division of Emergency Management, said the state has opened sites to improve access, including one outside Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens, where he spoke at a news conference this month. Still, Moskowitz acknowledged that “less and less people are coming to these sites, and we’ve seen that decline in the numbers.”

And in Arizona, 5,400 people turned out for a Saturday “testing blitz” held May 2 in dozens of community locations for people with symptoms or who think they have had contact with the virus. Health officials had been hoping for 10,000, and have since extended the blitz to every Saturday in May.

Although Massachusetts has tested nearly 6 percent of its population — one of the highest rates in the nation — even Gov. Charlie Baker (R) has been frustrated by a lack of interest in testing. Earlier this month, Baker chastised Bay State residents for refusing tests even in highly vulnerable settings such as nursing homes.

“There’s some people who, for whatever reason, don’t want to be tested,” Baker told reporters. “And we’re just going to have to find a way to work through that.”

[kennethmjoyner]

LSC’s $4.2M in Technology Grants Illustrate How Tech is Driving Access to Justice

For all the talk about using technology to enhance access to justice, it puts things in perspective to see tangible examples. One of the best sources of such examples is the annual set of Technology Initiative Grants awarded by the Legal Services Corporation.

Established in 2000, the TIG program distributes grants annual to LSC-funded legal aid organizations around the country. The grants are made to fund technology projects that provide greater access to legal assistance and information for low-income Americans.

In total over the years, LSC has made grants of more than 65 million to fund more than 720 technology projects. Grant recipients have used this funding to create new ways to serve clients, strengthen program capacity, and support the work of pro bono attorneys.

Recently, the LSC announced this year’s grants — a total of $4,230,718 awarded to 30 legal services organizations. The programs that received grants range from several designed to improve online self-help resources to others that will seek to increase access to justice for vulnerable populations, including those with limited English proficiency and, in other case, individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing.

“LSC’s Technology Initiative Grants increase access to justice for low-income people with critical civil legal needs,” LSC President Jim Sandman said in a statement announcing this year’s grants. “These technology projects improve the delivery of legal services and information to the millions of Americans who would otherwise have to navigate the legal system alone.”

The 2019 TIG projects are:

ALASKA

Alaska Legal Services Corporation

Alaska Legal Services Corporation will receive $283,089 to create a web application, BeneFactor, to inform and assist individuals applying for social security disability benefits. Users will receive the knowledge and assistance necessary to take control of their disability application throughout the process, including during a reconsideration or appeal. If they need additional help, users will be able to submit their case file to a legal representative.

AMERICAN SAMOA

American Samoa Legal Aid

American Samoa Legal Aid will receive $73,200 to upgrade the organization’s website. Improvements include adding more relevant legal information, creating interactive online tools for self-represented litigants with high-demand case types, and improving online accessibility for disabled and non-English speaking individuals.

CALIFORNIA

Inland Counties Legal Services, Inc.

Inland Counties Legal Services will receive $97,464 to expand and modify its existing online legal help tools for litigants with consumer debt cases. The project will automate aspects of legal document preparation to improve efficiency for legal professionals, including through an integration with the program’s case management system.

Legal Aid Society of San Diego, Inc.

The Legal Aid Society of San Diego will receive $90,000 to deploy an enhanced data migration system for the Health Consumer Alliance (HCA) of California. This will allow for HCA’s seamless transmission of client health advocacy data to a new database and to HCA’s partners, including the state’s nine other LSC grantees.

COLORADO

Colorado Legal Services

Colorado Legal Services will receive $100,200 to implement a virtual video or walk-through of going to a Colorado courthouse.

GEORGIA

Atlanta Legal Aid Society, Inc.

Atlanta Legal Aid Society will receive $90,650 to make AyudaLegalGeorgia.org, its Spanish-language, self-help website, more accessible to online visitors. The organization will also improve online intake for Spanish-speaking clients through its integrated case management system.

Georgia Legal Services Program

Georgia Legal Services Program will receive $218,007 to build online, interactive tutorials on landlord-tenant law. The focus will be on teaching self-represented tenants their rights and the steps for proceeding with a case, as well as training pro bono attorneys and legal aid staff. The tutorials will require participants to answer multiple-choice questions to ensure understanding and to maximize effectiveness.

ILLINOIS

Legal Aid Chicago 

Legal Aid Chicago will receive $184,200 to improve online legal content by coordinating with Illinois Legal Aid Online and legal experts. The project will employ a new content-organization model for delivering legal information that is accurate and up-to-date. Improved information distribution and sharing between different platforms will enhance accessibility for users.

Prairie State Legal Services, Inc. 

Prairie State Legal Services will receive $27,500 to conduct an evaluation of the organization’s technological capabilities. The evaluation will identify weaknesses and needs regarding hardware, software, and security. The findings will be used to create a prioritized plan for system upgrades.

KENTUCKY

Kentucky Legal Aid

Kentucky Legal Aid will receive $26,500 to retain an independent consultant to perform a technology assessment of the organization. The consultant will then help develop a technology improvement plan with Kentucky Legal Aid staff, including plan implementation priorities.

Legal Aid of the Bluegrass 

Legal Aid of the Bluegrass will receive $176,966 to redesign the state’s legal information website, kyjustice.org. The goal is to make the website more user-friendly and to add new content, including easy-to-use guides and templates. The new content will have search functions so self-represented litigants can easily learn about laws relevant to their cases

MICHIGAN

Legal Services of Eastern Michigan 

Legal Services of Eastern Michigan will receive to $180,838 to launch a mobile-friendly, web application that will provide users with Fair Housing Act information, allow Legal Services of Eastern Michigan to administer fair housing tests, and provide both testers and the organization with timely reports on test results. The project has the potential for nationwide implementation.

Michigan Advocacy Program

Michigan Advocacy Program will receive two grants. The first grant, for $114,300, will allow the organization to enhance its ability to engage in simple, automated text conversations with users of Michigan Legal Help, an online resource for people with civil legal problems. The project will include text conversations focused on follow-up assistance and tracking user outcomes. A second grant, for $177,500, will allow the organization to improve online, guided client interviews and other key client-facing applications. A professional user-experience reviewer will provide feedback on individual applications and lead in-depth user-experience training.

MINNESOTA

Central Minnesota Legal Services Inc.

Central Minnesota Legal Services will receive $102,478 to upgrade the statewide legal information website, www.lawhelpmn.org, with better interactive content to improve user learning. The new content will integrate short videos and tests within the site’s existing fact sheets. This project will also incorporate real-time feedback for the online test-takers through live chat and other tools.

Legal Aid Service of Northeastern Minnesota

Legal Aid Service of Northeastern Minnesota will receive $177,500 to develop a large business improvement process project for the state’s regional client intake system. It will work with two LSC-funded technology improvement projects at Southern Minnesota Regional Legal Services and Legal Aid of Western Missouri.

Southern Minnesota Regional Legal Services, Inc.

Southern Minnesota Regional Legal Services will receive $27,500 to improve its intake, workflow, staffing, and technology configurations. Better intake processes will enable clients to access information and resources they need quickly and easily.

MISSOURI

Legal Aid of Western Missouri

Legal Aid of Western Missouri will receive $27,500 to consult with process improvement professionals to address the organization’s intake, workflow, and technology systems.

MISSISSIPPI 

Mississippi Center for Legal Services

Mississippi Center for Legal Services will receive $27,500 to conduct a comprehensive technology assessment and develop a strategic technology plan. Prioritized recommendations will address the immediate needs of both LSC grantees in the state, North Mississippi Rural Legal Services and Mississippi Center for Legal Services.

NEW HAMPSHIRE

Legal Advice & Referral Center, Inc.

Legal Advice & Referral Center will receive $62,290 to create an online self-help pilot project for self-represented litigants. The project will focus on low-income individuals with housing and consumer law problems. It will employ legal document assembly software and other technology tools to assist individuals who have to navigate the justice system without the help of an attorney.

NEW JERSEY 

Northeast New Jersey Legal Services Corporation

Northeast New Jersey Legal Services Corporation will receive $27,500 to review the technology behind its client intake system and to develop a plan to improve intake efficiency. The plan will reduce wait times and assist people with the most pressing legal needs. The plan will also address the needs of people with limited English proficiency.

OHIO

Community Legal Aid Services, Inc.

Community Legal Aid Services will receive $162,500 to partner with Ohio Legal Help to develop better functionality for the state’s legal information website, www.ohiolegalhelp.org, and provide mobile access for users. Users will be able to create a personalized dashboard where they can save and retrieve assembled documents, articles, and other ongoing tasks. The new functionality will allow the system to send out text reminders to users about actions to take.

Ohio State Legal Services

Ohio State Legal Services will receive $790,000 to continue growing the capability and reliability of LawHelp Interactive (LHI), a free online resource for drafting legal forms and documents in over 40 states. LHI is a partnership with Pro Bono Net, a nonprofit that uses technology to increase access to justice.

PENNSYLVANIA

North Penn Legal Services, Inc.

North Penn Legal Services will receive $195,000 to create a statewide, online system for conducting quick intake and referrals. The system will connect low-income individuals to a legal aid provider or resource that can best meet their needs. It will take account of the case priorities of project partners, adding needed flexibility when directing users to an appropriate provider during intake.

Philadelphia Legal Assistance Center

Philadelphia Legal Assistance Center will receive $298,500 to partner with Upsolve.org to develop artificial intelligence-enabled tools to help individuals filing for Chapter 7 bankruptcy. These tools will guide users throughout the bankruptcy process, translating court filings into plain language, setting appointment reminders, and monitoring court schedules for case activity. Users will be able to access these services through the national Upsolve.org platform.

SOUTH CAROLINA

South Carolina Legal Services, Inc.

South Carolina Legal Services will receive $155,940 to expand the number of online “classrooms” they offer. Six new courses will focus on eviction, criminal records expungement, foreclosure, heir’s property, education rights, and debt collection. South Carolina Legal Services is partnering with the South Carolina Pro Bono Board on the project.

VERMONT

Legal Services Vermont

Legal Services Vermont will receive $152,940 to create more online content for self-represented litigants. The organization will add tutorials for high-demand legal issues, including evictions cases and temporary restraining orders in domestic violence cases. The expanded library of online tutorials will feature a series of instructional videos informing viewers how to fill out court forms or initiate certain legal actions.

WASHINGTON

Northwest Justice Project

Northwest Justice Project will receive $51,330 to implement technologies that increase access to legal services for deaf, hard-of hearing, and deaf-blind individuals. Tablets with unique software will be placed in each of the field offices so that these clients can immediately communicate with staff or an attorney without having to wait for an interpreter.

WASHINGTON, D.C.

Neighborhood Legal Services Program

Neighborhood Legal Services Program will receive $27,500 to conduct a full assessment of its current technology systems and identify areas for improvement and investment.

WYOMING

Legal Aid of Wyoming, Inc.

Legal Aid of Wyoming will receive $105,000 to develop a triage system to guide people to the best resources for their situation. The system, which builds on a previous TIG award, will have built-in features that improve the effectiveness of the client experience, like automated messaging. Legal Aid of Wyoming will also implement a comprehensive outreach plan to publicize the legal services and the resources they offer.

  from Law and Politics https://www.lawsitesblog.com/2019/10/lscs-4-2m-in-technology-grants-illustrate-how-tech-is-driving-access-to-justice.html via http://www.rssmix.com/

[morningusa]

(Bloomberg) -- After two gruesome mass shootings in a 24-hour span, some Republicans are raising alarms that their opposition to new firearm limits is making the party toxic to the suburban women and college graduates who will shape the 2020 election.“Republicans are headed for extinction in the suburbs if they don’t distance themselves from the NRA. The GOP needs to put forth solutions to help eradicate the gun violence epidemic,” said Dan Eberhart, a Republican donor and oil-and-gas executive who supports President Donald Trump.Last year, Eberhart said, he was having lunch with Rick Scott when the then-Florida governor learned of the massacre unfolding in Parkland. It marked the deadliest high school shooting in U.S. history, as a gunman used an AR-15-style rifle to kill 17 people. Eighteen months later, as the country reels from killing sprees in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, Eberhart said it’s time to join Democrats and majorities of Americans who want to ban those types of guns.“The GOP needs to make several moves such as universal background checks, eliminating loopholes and banning military-style assault weapons to neutralize the issue,” he said. “Otherwise, Republicans will lose suburban voters just like they did in the midterms on health care.”While most Republicans have opposed expanding background checks and banning assault-rifles, GOP Senator Lindsey Graham said Monday he cut a deal with Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal on “red flag” legislation to assist and encourage states to keep guns away from people who are found to pose an imminent risk of violence. Many Democrats said that wasn’t enough and called for a renewal of the assault-weapons ban and universal background checks, among other measures.The 2018 election reflected a changing landscape on guns. Republicans were swept out of the House majority after losing suburban bastions where they were once dominant — in places like Orange County, California, and around Dallas and Houston in Texas. Voters in 2018 favored stricter gun control by a margin of 22 percentage points, and those who did backed Democrats by a margin of 76% to 22%, according to exit polls. Gun policy ranked as the No. 4 concern, and voters who cited it as their top issue voted for Democrats by a margin of 70% to 29%.And the mood has changed since 2016.The gun issue propelled Trump in key states like Florida, Ohio, North Carolina and Pennsylvania among voters who opposed Democratic nominee Hillary Rodham Clinton’s support for gun control, said Republican strategist Brad Todd, whose firm polled on the issue. Todd said swing voters may still “see upsides and downsides to both approaches” on gun policy.There have been 255 mass shootings so far this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive, which counts incidents where at least four people were shot or killed, not including the shooter. With the presidential election 15 months away, it’s unclear just how salient the issue of guns will be in shaping voter behavior.GOP ‘Takes a Hit’The renewed debate captures a dilemma for Trump as he revs up his re-election campaign with appeals to rural Americans steeped in a rich gun culture. But he risks alienating upper-income suburbanites, who can make or break his prospects, if he’s seen as unwilling to take action to stop frequent mass shootings.All of the major Democratic candidates are running on gun control measures, including tougher background checks and banning assault weapons, setting up a stark contrast with Trump.“Every time the country experiences a tragedy of this nature the Republican brand takes a hit,” said Carlos Curbelo, a Republican former congressman who lost his suburban Miami-area district to a Democrat in 2018. “Because many, many Americans perceive that Republicans are unwilling to act on gun reform, due to the influence of the NRA and other organizations.”“Certainly in swing suburban districts there is broad support for” policies like universal background checks and 72-hour waiting periods, Curbelo said. “A lot of voters, especially young voters, have lost their patience with this issue.”A Marist poll last month, commissioned by NPR and PBS, found that 57% of American adults support banning “the sale of semi-automatic assault guns such as the AK-47 or the AR-15,” while 41% oppose it. Support for such bans was 62% among suburbanites, 74% among women in the suburbs and small cities, and 65% among white college graduates.But the survey found broad opposition to banning semi-automatic assault weapons among the core elements of Trump’s coalition — 67% among Republicans, 67% among conservatives, 65% among white men without college degrees, and 51% among rural Americans.Gun VotersThe party’s longstanding opposition to gun control is a product of party leaders working to consolidate single-issue firearms voters who reliably turn out in elections and tend to view any new restrictions as a threat to their Second Amendment rights.It explains why most Republicans oppose even modest measures like universal background checks, which received 89% national support in the Marist poll, including large majorities across all demographic and party affiliations. The NRA opposes that proposal, too.“The NRA is committed to the safe and lawful use of firearms by those exercising their Second Amendment freedoms,” the NRA said in a statement Sunday, adding that it “will not participate in the politicizing of these tragedies” but will work to pursue practical solutions.Earlier this year, eight House Republicans from suburban or competitive districts voted with Democrats to pass a bill that would impose background checks on buyers for gun sales considered private, which are not currently required by federal law.But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, has refused to consider the bill, and Trump has threatened to veto it.In a statement Monday, Trump denounced the “twisted” killers over the weekend and called for new “red flag” laws to keep firearms away from people found to be dangerous. He blamed the internet, social media and violent video games for pushing people toward violence, though he suggested easy access to guns wasn’t the problem.“Mental illness and hatred pulls the trigger, not the gun,” he said.Gun politics have shifted since President Barack Obama avoided the issue in his 2008 and 2012 campaigns for fear that it was a political loser. During Obama’s first term, the country was evenly divided on whether gun laws should be made stricter or stay the same, according to Gallup. By October 2018, support for stricter firearm laws outnumbered support for maintaining them by 31 points.Background ChecksThe shift was propelled by the Newtown elementary school massacre in December 2012, after which Senate Democratic leaders attempted to pass a bipartisan bill to require universal background checks, but were thwarted by a coalition of mostly Republicans.Senator Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, the Republican co-author of the bill, said Monday he spoke with Trump and urged him to support the measure, adding that the president expressed openness to work on background check legislation.Toomey said he hoped that “the accumulated pain from so many of these horrific experiences will be motivation to do something.”“I hope we’re at a moment where the atmosphere has changed,” Toomey told reporters.Senator Mitt Romney of Utah, the party’s 2012 presidential nominee, signaled openness to new gun laws on Sunday and said he wants to be a “constructive voice” in the debate.“These issues involve constitutional rights and deeply held beliefs – but that is not an excuse to shy away from a serious, fact-based, and thorough national discussion which will potentially lead to remedial legislation,” he said.Michael Bloomberg, owner of Bloomberg LP, the parent company of Bloomberg News, founded and helps fund Everytown for Gun Safety, a nonprofit that advocates for gun control measures.(Updates with GOP strategist on 2016 in seventh, eighth paragraphs.)To contact the reporter on this story: Sahil Kapur in Washington at skapur39@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Wendy Benjaminson at wbenjaminson@bloomberg.net, Laurie AsséoFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines

[easyfoodnetwork]

Shutterstock/Kondor83 Restaurant employees from Kentucky, North Dakota, New York, Oregon, and Minnesota share their stories Last week, President Trump formed the Economic Revival Industry Group, a collection of 200 experts and industry leaders to inform the (possibly ill-advised) campaign to re-open the economy. The group, focused on restaurants, included numerous chain CEOs and celebrity chef-owners like Wolfgang Puck and Thomas Keller. And though the latter could hardly be expected to advocate for the needs of restaurant owners whose restaurants don’t have Michelin stars, there is another group notably absent from the committee: restaurant workers. Independent restaurant owners are struggling with the realities and uncertainties of life in a pandemic, whether it’s having to lay off employees or trying to keep people paid as the business pivots to take-out only. But for your average food service worker — servers, bartenders, line cooks, and baristas — there is even less support. Restaurant employees made up 60 percent of the jobs lost in March. Twenty-two million people filed for unemployment in the past four weeks, leaving unemployment websites overwhelmed. The Paycheck Protection Program, which offers federal loans in exchange for keeping employees on payroll, is out of money. All this adds up to millions of food service workers being left without a paycheck. Despite Trump’s plans, no one knows what the restaurant industry is going to look like on the other side of the pandemic. And so workers wait, hoping their restaurants will reopen, hoping they or their coworkers will be rehired, hoping there will be a workplace to come back to. As chains and fine-dining chefs are the only ones with access to the White House, it’s important to remember their experiences do not represent the restaurant industry as a whole. Whether or not restaurant workers, not merely restaurateurs, feel supported will be the true test of any government program’s success. With that in mind, we spoke to five restaurant workers across the country on what they’re experiencing right now. These are stories in their own words, edited lightly for clarity. Gregg Adams, line cook at J Harrods, Louisville, Kentucky The chef and I are the only kitchen staff left of four full-time and two part-timers. He takes a salary, I am on reduced hours, which means less money to repair the house and cars, much less save anything. Since this began we have been steadily losing customers. Our food isn’t geared for takeout, though we changed the menu some. Also, we made a lot of our money through drinks. Initially, the state only allowed the sale of closed alcohol containers, and some restaurants started selling flight bottles and half pints with soda or cup mixer on the side. Within a week, open alcohol sales were allowed rather than just packaged liquor, but it was too late for those who followed the rules. I’m hanging in there, but I’m lucky. Not much has changed for me and my family. My wife is on medical disability with fixed income and doesn’t leave the house much. My teenager already practiced social distancing. My 26-year-old is working 60 hours a week at a local coffee chain. My 25-year-old works for UPS. I’m blessed to have employment. I know three other cooks and two chefs who are unemployed. But I can’t plan anything for anything now. I’m wondering about my concert tickets and my child’s education if my older children will get sick, and what my options are in general. I’m trying to not panic. Massoud Violette-Sheikh, sous chef at the Heights, Ithaca, New York I am 23 years old and have been working in the industry for five years, starting as a dishwasher at the Heights. My start in the industry was mainly out of necessity — dishwashing offered good hours and the possibility of upward mobility in the restaurant. But the work ethic and our local food community was contagious; I wouldn’t want to be in any other industry, even in these times. I rose to sous this past year. In an area where we are financially dependent on Ithaca College and Cornell as our main contributors to economic stimulation, this has train-wrecked the local economy. At the Heights, all staff with the exception of our chef de cuisine have been temporarily let go. I think the post-pandemic dining landscape is going to be entirely different — staff cuts, wage cuts, and mandatory seating reduction will absolutely affect how we are able to eat. Even the most luxurious restaurants will have to cut back on menus, garnishes, and available reservations. I’m hopeful that diners will come out in droves after restaurants open up, but realistically that’s not likely. The social habits that we develop will linger. I spend a lot of time talking with my close friends and coworkers. Everyone just wants to be back in the kitchen — to be back home. As an individual I’m grateful for private grants such as the Restaurant Employee Relief Fund — programs like that are going to be our saviors. But our primary concern is how long our local independent restaurants, farms, and purveyors will be able to stay open. The debt to equity ratio in our industry is very high, and I expect to see places sink into irreversible debt. I hope customers will be patient as we get back on our feet; without their support, all that will be left is Chili’s and McDonald’s. Marlena Chaboudy, cook at A Frame Bar & Grill, Westhope, North Dakota Busy season is the beginning of spring through the end of summer. We are situated on Lake Metigoshe, and when the snow melts people start moving in their boats and readying their docks to enjoy their summer. We were all gearing up for that when the spread of the virus hit hard and hours were cut. Our place was then shut down for dine-in service and we tried to stay positive. I found out the secret was really not to make eye contact, because if I saw one of us start to tear up, it opened the floodgates for me. I’m behind in rent, my vehicle is in need of a few repairs. I had planned on moving closer to work — I live about 40 miles away — and found a place, but will have to come by money for the utility and house deposits and rent in order to do so. My fiancé and I live together, and he also works at the A-Frame as a dishwasher. He has filed for unemployment but has a limited work history and hasn’t paid in enough in the quarters to draw unemployment. And he won’t get the one-sum stimulus check either, and that’s going to hurt. Living in a rural community, you can’t count on anything for relief. You can’t count on the small town store to get a delivery truck, or go to the store the same day and be able to buy a roll of toilet paper or a dozen eggs. I can’t guarantee that my internet will be functional much less my phone service, and trying to even access the unemployment website can take all day. You go to the gas station for a treat and you never know if they are open because if they haven’t had enough business that day to justify keeping the lights on, or paying an employee to sit there, they close early. I don’t think the aid the government is giving is enough. Not at all! It’s getting bad everywhere. The people in the foodservice industry are the “blue collar” workers that everyone forgets about. We are not paid as much as the blue collar norm and making ends meet isn’t looking possible for most. Rae Bullinger, former front of house at Rise Bagels, Minneapolis We closed our dining room around March 16th, but kept our online and takeout phone ordering systems the same. After closing the dining room, it was fairly slow that first week, but we kept advertising the online and pick-up ordering and by the weekend our system just couldn’t keep up. On my weekend shift, we were so overwhelmed with online orders overnight that we actually had to turn the first customers away, because we were still trying to catch up with the online orders. The next day is when the owners decided to temporarily close. Before coronavirus, we had a good sense of how many bagels we needed each day of the week to fill our normal amount of orders. Once we started advertising more about online and phone ordering mid-March, our demand shifted to a point we couldn’t have predicted. Before I started my job at Rise Bagel, I was a graduate student in the psychology field. I had to take a leave of absence in October due to an inpatient stay for my mental health, and decided to put school on pause and pursue a new career in food sustainability. I thought getting my foot in the door at a local restaurant that focuses on local, organic ingredients and sustainable practices would provide me with some great insight. The job finally gave me a sense of purpose and control when I hadn’t had that in a long time. However, when we suddenly had to close, it was like my sense of purpose also disappeared. My job was the one thing that kept me feeling certain about my future. Uncertainty about my future at Rise has led to an increase in my anxiety around leaving school and my future career. I have many fears of having to start all over again, and it’s hard to stay motivated when I can’t gain restaurant experience from my home. Here in Minnesota, individual unemployment benefits are only given if you had made $3,000 or more before unemployment. Because I was in graduate school and had only been at my job at Rise for a few months, I did not meet this requirement and will not be receiving any unemployment benefits. For those making minimum wage (aka many of those in the food service industry), prerequisites like this may have some major impacts. I’m incredibly thankful to be living at home during this time with great support, but I couldn’t imagine being in a more dire situation and then denied benefits based on something I may not have had control over. I’m really glad something is being done for small business owners, but what really matters is what happens after this. A restaurant will only survive if better legislation is passed and people continue to visit even after social distancing orders are lifted. The attention and support food service employees and places are getting right now is amazing, but systematic change needs to occur for them to continue to survive. Ashton Long, bartender, Portland, Oregon We were all in an especially odd situation because we had just all been through training and had opened the restaurant, Bar King, to the public Monday, March 9th. Our restaurant closed down to the public on March 15th and began only providing takeout orders. Luckily, right now it is looking like we’ll be opening back up and all have our jobs back, but when? I don’t think anyone has even a clue. And that is terrifying. My partner and I moved here in early January of this year. Luckily, he works from home, but I set out to find a job as soon as I got here, and even with my experience and my resume, it took me nearly two months to find something because of how competitive the service industry staffing is in Portland. I exhausted nearly all of my savings and threw all of my faith into the fact that I’d find a job when I got here, and then I worked for literally two weeks and then lost my job. I don’t remember a time in my life where I didn’t have two jobs and work anywhere from 40 to 70 hours a week, so having this much free time, and on such an incredibly STRICT budget of one income, has been extremely challenging to fill. While I think the stimulus money is great, and quite literally a life saver for many — including me — unemployment has been a literal shit show and a nightmare to deal with. I still have yet to see any benefits or correspondence from either Michigan or Oregon to figure out what I need to do in this situation where I lived and worked in Michigan last year and Oregon now. While I do understand that having 2.2 MILLION people sign up for unemployment in the last month is overwhelming, if it weren’t for the stimulus check and my partner, I could very well be on my way back to Michigan right now to live with family. And as a 25-year-old who has never had to consider an option like that because I’ve always had work and savings, that is a horrifying and scary scenario. If you’re a food service worker, Eater wants to hear your story. Please fill out this survey. from Eater - All https://ift.tt/3cz9Lic

http://easyfoodnetwork.blogspot.com/2020/04/dispatches-from-food-service-workers.html

[worldnews-blog]

(Bloomberg) -- After two gruesome mass shootings in a 24-hour span, some Republicans are raising alarms that their opposition to new firearm limits is making the party toxic to the suburban women and college graduates who will shape the 2020 election.“Republicans are headed for extinction in the suburbs if they don’t distance themselves from the NRA. The GOP needs to put forth solutions to help eradicate the gun violence epidemic,” said Dan Eberhart, a Republican donor and oil-and-gas executive who supports President Donald Trump.Last year, Eberhart said, he was having lunch with Rick Scott when the then-Florida governor learned of the massacre unfolding in Parkland. It marked the deadliest high school shooting in U.S. history, as a gunman used an AR-15-style rifle to kill 17 people. Eighteen months later, as the country reels from killing sprees in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, Eberhart said it’s time to join Democrats and majorities of Americans who want to ban those types of guns.“The GOP needs to make several moves such as universal background checks, eliminating loopholes and banning military-style assault weapons to neutralize the issue,” he said. “Otherwise, Republicans will lose suburban voters just like they did in the midterms on health care.”While most Republicans have opposed expanding background checks and banning assault-rifles, GOP Senator Lindsey Graham said Monday he cut a deal with Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal on “red flag” legislation to assist and encourage states to keep guns away from people who are found to pose an imminent risk of violence. Many Democrats said that wasn’t enough and called for a renewal of the assault-weapons ban and universal background checks, among other measures.The 2018 election reflected a changing landscape on guns. Republicans were swept out of the House majority after losing suburban bastions where they were once dominant — in places like Orange County, California, and around Dallas and Houston in Texas. Voters in 2018 favored stricter gun control by a margin of 22 percentage points, and those who did backed Democrats by a margin of 76% to 22%, according to exit polls. Gun policy ranked as the No. 4 concern, and voters who cited it as their top issue voted for Democrats by a margin of 70% to 29%.And the mood has changed since 2016.The gun issue propelled Trump in key states like Florida, Ohio, North Carolina and Pennsylvania among voters who opposed Democratic nominee Hillary Rodham Clinton’s support for gun control, said Republican strategist Brad Todd, whose firm polled on the issue. Todd said swing voters may still “see upsides and downsides to both approaches” on gun policy.There have been 255 mass shootings so far this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive, which counts incidents where at least four people were shot or killed, not including the shooter. With the presidential election 15 months away, it’s unclear just how salient the issue of guns will be in shaping voter behavior.GOP ‘Takes a Hit’The renewed debate captures a dilemma for Trump as he revs up his re-election campaign with appeals to rural Americans steeped in a rich gun culture. But he risks alienating upper-income suburbanites, who can make or break his prospects, if he’s seen as unwilling to take action to stop frequent mass shootings.All of the major Democratic candidates are running on gun control measures, including tougher background checks and banning assault weapons, setting up a stark contrast with Trump.“Every time the country experiences a tragedy of this nature the Republican brand takes a hit,” said Carlos Curbelo, a Republican former congressman who lost his suburban Miami-area district to a Democrat in 2018. “Because many, many Americans perceive that Republicans are unwilling to act on gun reform, due to the influence of the NRA and other organizations.”“Certainly in swing suburban districts there is broad support for” policies like universal background checks and 72-hour waiting periods, Curbelo said. “A lot of voters, especially young voters, have lost their patience with this issue.”A Marist poll last month, commissioned by NPR and PBS, found that 57% of American adults support banning “the sale of semi-automatic assault guns such as the AK-47 or the AR-15,” while 41% oppose it. Support for such bans was 62% among suburbanites, 74% among women in the suburbs and small cities, and 65% among white college graduates.But the survey found broad opposition to banning semi-automatic assault weapons among the core elements of Trump’s coalition — 67% among Republicans, 67% among conservatives, 65% among white men without college degrees, and 51% among rural Americans.Gun VotersThe party’s longstanding opposition to gun control is a product of party leaders working to consolidate single-issue firearms voters who reliably turn out in elections and tend to view any new restrictions as a threat to their Second Amendment rights.It explains why most Republicans oppose even modest measures like universal background checks, which received 89% national support in the Marist poll, including large majorities across all demographic and party affiliations. The NRA opposes that proposal, too.“The NRA is committed to the safe and lawful use of firearms by those exercising their Second Amendment freedoms,” the NRA said in a statement Sunday, adding that it “will not participate in the politicizing of these tragedies” but will work to pursue practical solutions.Earlier this year, eight House Republicans from suburban or competitive districts voted with Democrats to pass a bill that would impose background checks on buyers for gun sales considered private, which are not currently required by federal law.But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, has refused to consider the bill, and Trump has threatened to veto it.In a statement Monday, Trump denounced the “twisted” killers over the weekend and called for new “red flag” laws to keep firearms away from people found to be dangerous. He blamed the internet, social media and violent video games for pushing people toward violence, though he suggested easy access to guns wasn’t the problem.“Mental illness and hatred pulls the trigger, not the gun,” he said.Gun politics have shifted since President Barack Obama avoided the issue in his 2008 and 2012 campaigns for fear that it was a political loser. During Obama’s first term, the country was evenly divided on whether gun laws should be made stricter or stay the same, according to Gallup. By October 2018, support for stricter firearm laws outnumbered support for maintaining them by 31 points.Background ChecksThe shift was propelled by the Newtown elementary school massacre in December 2012, after which Senate Democratic leaders attempted to pass a bipartisan bill to require universal background checks, but were thwarted by a coalition of mostly Republicans.Senator Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, the Republican co-author of the bill, said Monday he spoke with Trump and urged him to support the measure, adding that the president expressed openness to work on background check legislation.Toomey said he hoped that “the accumulated pain from so many of these horrific experiences will be motivation to do something.”“I hope we’re at a moment where the atmosphere has changed,” Toomey told reporters.Senator Mitt Romney of Utah, the party’s 2012 presidential nominee, signaled openness to new gun laws on Sunday and said he wants to be a “constructive voice” in the debate.“These issues involve constitutional rights and deeply held beliefs – but that is not an excuse to shy away from a serious, fact-based, and thorough national discussion which will potentially lead to remedial legislation,” he said.Michael Bloomberg, owner of Bloomberg LP, the parent company of Bloomberg News, founded and helps fund Everytown for Gun Safety, a nonprofit that advocates for gun control measures.(Updates with GOP strategist on 2016 in seventh, eighth paragraphs.)To contact the reporter on this story: Sahil Kapur in Washington at skapur39@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Wendy Benjaminson at wbenjaminson@bloomberg.net, Laurie AsséoFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/2Kk0cZx

[worldtopnewsoftheday]

(Bloomberg) -- After two gruesome mass shootings in a 24-hour span, some Republicans are raising alarms that their opposition to new firearm limits is making the party toxic to the suburban women and college graduates who will shape the 2020 election.“Republicans are headed for extinction in the suburbs if they don’t distance themselves from the NRA. The GOP needs to put forth solutions to help eradicate the gun violence epidemic,” said Dan Eberhart, a Republican donor and oil-and-gas executive who supports President Donald Trump.Last year, Eberhart said, he was having lunch with Rick Scott when the then-Florida governor learned of the massacre unfolding in Parkland. It marked the deadliest high school shooting in U.S. history, as a gunman used an AR-15-style rifle to kill 17 people. Eighteen months later, as the country reels from killing sprees in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, Eberhart said it’s time to join Democrats and majorities of Americans who want to ban those types of guns.“The GOP needs to make several moves such as universal background checks, eliminating loopholes and banning military-style assault weapons to neutralize the issue,” he said. “Otherwise, Republicans will lose suburban voters just like they did in the midterms on health care.”While most Republicans have opposed expanding background checks and banning assault-rifles, GOP Senator Lindsey Graham said Monday he cut a deal with Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal on “red flag” legislation to assist and encourage states to keep guns away from people who are found to pose an imminent risk of violence. Many Democrats said that wasn’t enough and called for a renewal of the assault-weapons ban and universal background checks, among other measures.The 2018 election reflected a changing landscape on guns. Republicans were swept out of the House majority after losing suburban bastions where they were once dominant — in places like Orange County, California, and around Dallas and Houston in Texas. Voters in 2018 favored stricter gun control by a margin of 22 percentage points, and those who did backed Democrats by a margin of 76% to 22%, according to exit polls. Gun policy ranked as the No. 4 concern, and voters who cited it as their top issue voted for Democrats by a margin of 70% to 29%.And the mood has changed since 2016.The gun issue propelled Trump in key states like Florida, Ohio, North Carolina and Pennsylvania among voters who opposed Democratic nominee Hillary Rodham Clinton’s support for gun control, said Republican strategist Brad Todd, whose firm polled on the issue. Todd said swing voters may still “see upsides and downsides to both approaches” on gun policy.There have been 255 mass shootings so far this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive, which counts incidents where at least four people were shot or killed, not including the shooter. With the presidential election 15 months away, it’s unclear just how salient the issue of guns will be in shaping voter behavior.GOP ‘Takes a Hit’The renewed debate captures a dilemma for Trump as he revs up his re-election campaign with appeals to rural Americans steeped in a rich gun culture. But he risks alienating upper-income suburbanites, who can make or break his prospects, if he’s seen as unwilling to take action to stop frequent mass shootings.All of the major Democratic candidates are running on gun control measures, including tougher background checks and banning assault weapons, setting up a stark contrast with Trump.“Every time the country experiences a tragedy of this nature the Republican brand takes a hit,” said Carlos Curbelo, a Republican former congressman who lost his suburban Miami-area district to a Democrat in 2018. “Because many, many Americans perceive that Republicans are unwilling to act on gun reform, due to the influence of the NRA and other organizations.”“Certainly in swing suburban districts there is broad support for” policies like universal background checks and 72-hour waiting periods, Curbelo said. “A lot of voters, especially young voters, have lost their patience with this issue.”A Marist poll last month, commissioned by NPR and PBS, found that 57% of American adults support banning “the sale of semi-automatic assault guns such as the AK-47 or the AR-15,” while 41% oppose it. Support for such bans was 62% among suburbanites, 74% among women in the suburbs and small cities, and 65% among white college graduates.But the survey found broad opposition to banning semi-automatic assault weapons among the core elements of Trump’s coalition — 67% among Republicans, 67% among conservatives, 65% among white men without college degrees, and 51% among rural Americans.Gun VotersThe party’s longstanding opposition to gun control is a product of party leaders working to consolidate single-issue firearms voters who reliably turn out in elections and tend to view any new restrictions as a threat to their Second Amendment rights.It explains why most Republicans oppose even modest measures like universal background checks, which received 89% national support in the Marist poll, including large majorities across all demographic and party affiliations. The NRA opposes that proposal, too.“The NRA is committed to the safe and lawful use of firearms by those exercising their Second Amendment freedoms,” the NRA said in a statement Sunday, adding that it “will not participate in the politicizing of these tragedies” but will work to pursue practical solutions.Earlier this year, eight House Republicans from suburban or competitive districts voted with Democrats to pass a bill that would impose background checks on buyers for gun sales considered private, which are not currently required by federal law.But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, has refused to consider the bill, and Trump has threatened to veto it.In a statement Monday, Trump denounced the “twisted” killers over the weekend and called for new “red flag” laws to keep firearms away from people found to be dangerous. He blamed the internet, social media and violent video games for pushing people toward violence, though he suggested easy access to guns wasn’t the problem.“Mental illness and hatred pulls the trigger, not the gun,” he said.Gun politics have shifted since President Barack Obama avoided the issue in his 2008 and 2012 campaigns for fear that it was a political loser. During Obama’s first term, the country was evenly divided on whether gun laws should be made stricter or stay the same, according to Gallup. By October 2018, support for stricter firearm laws outnumbered support for maintaining them by 31 points.Background ChecksThe shift was propelled by the Newtown elementary school massacre in December 2012, after which Senate Democratic leaders attempted to pass a bipartisan bill to require universal background checks, but were thwarted by a coalition of mostly Republicans.Senator Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, the Republican co-author of the bill, said Monday he spoke with Trump and urged him to support the measure, adding that the president expressed openness to work on background check legislation.Toomey said he hoped that “the accumulated pain from so many of these horrific experiences will be motivation to do something.”“I hope we’re at a moment where the atmosphere has changed,” Toomey told reporters.Senator Mitt Romney of Utah, the party’s 2012 presidential nominee, signaled openness to new gun laws on Sunday and said he wants to be a “constructive voice” in the debate.“These issues involve constitutional rights and deeply held beliefs – but that is not an excuse to shy away from a serious, fact-based, and thorough national discussion which will potentially lead to remedial legislation,” he said.Michael Bloomberg, owner of Bloomberg LP, the parent company of Bloomberg News, founded and helps fund Everytown for Gun Safety, a nonprofit that advocates for gun control measures.(Updates with GOP strategist on 2016 in seventh, eighth paragraphs.)To contact the reporter on this story: Sahil Kapur in Washington at skapur39@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Wendy Benjaminson at wbenjaminson@bloomberg.net, Laurie AsséoFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/2Kk0cZx

[kentuckybats]

New Kentucky USDA Rural Housing  Income limits for most counties in 2023

Kentucky USDA Rural Housing County Income Limits for 2023

[newsfundastuff]

(Bloomberg) -- After two gruesome mass shootings in a 24-hour span, some Republicans are raising alarms that their opposition to new firearm limits is making the party toxic to the suburban women and college graduates who will shape the 2020 election.“Republicans are headed for extinction in the suburbs if they don’t distance themselves from the NRA. The GOP needs to put forth solutions to help eradicate the gun violence epidemic,” said Dan Eberhart, a Republican donor and oil-and-gas executive who supports President Donald Trump.Last year, Eberhart said, he was having lunch with Rick Scott when the then-Florida governor learned of the massacre unfolding in Parkland. It marked the deadliest high school shooting in U.S. history, as a gunman used an AR-15-style rifle to kill 17 people. Eighteen months later, as the country reels from killing sprees in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, Eberhart said it’s time to join Democrats and majorities of Americans who want to ban those types of guns.“The GOP needs to make several moves such as universal background checks, eliminating loopholes and banning military-style assault weapons to neutralize the issue,” he said. “Otherwise, Republicans will lose suburban voters just like they did in the midterms on health care.”While most Republicans have opposed expanding background checks and banning assault-rifles, GOP Senator Lindsey Graham said Monday he cut a deal with Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal on “red flag” legislation to assist and encourage states to keep guns away from people who are found to pose an imminent risk of violence. Many Democrats said that wasn’t enough and called for a renewal of the assault-weapons ban and universal background checks, among other measures.The 2018 election reflected a changing landscape on guns. Republicans were swept out of the House majority after losing suburban bastions where they were once dominant — in places like Orange County, California, and around Dallas and Houston in Texas. Voters in 2018 favored stricter gun control by a margin of 22 percentage points, and those who did backed Democrats by a margin of 76% to 22%, according to exit polls. Gun policy ranked as the No. 4 concern, and voters who cited it as their top issue voted for Democrats by a margin of 70% to 29%.And the mood has changed since 2016.The gun issue propelled Trump in key states like Florida, Ohio, North Carolina and Pennsylvania among voters who opposed Democratic nominee Hillary Rodham Clinton’s support for gun control, said Republican strategist Brad Todd, whose firm polled on the issue. Todd said swing voters may still “see upsides and downsides to both approaches” on gun policy.There have been 255 mass shootings so far this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive, which counts incidents where at least four people were shot or killed, not including the shooter. With the presidential election 15 months away, it’s unclear just how salient the issue of guns will be in shaping voter behavior.GOP ‘Takes a Hit’The renewed debate captures a dilemma for Trump as he revs up his re-election campaign with appeals to rural Americans steeped in a rich gun culture. But he risks alienating upper-income suburbanites, who can make or break his prospects, if he’s seen as unwilling to take action to stop frequent mass shootings.All of the major Democratic candidates are running on gun control measures, including tougher background checks and banning assault weapons, setting up a stark contrast with Trump.“Every time the country experiences a tragedy of this nature the Republican brand takes a hit,” said Carlos Curbelo, a Republican former congressman who lost his suburban Miami-area district to a Democrat in 2018. “Because many, many Americans perceive that Republicans are unwilling to act on gun reform, due to the influence of the NRA and other organizations.”“Certainly in swing suburban districts there is broad support for” policies like universal background checks and 72-hour waiting periods, Curbelo said. “A lot of voters, especially young voters, have lost their patience with this issue.”A Marist poll last month, commissioned by NPR and PBS, found that 57% of American adults support banning “the sale of semi-automatic assault guns such as the AK-47 or the AR-15,” while 41% oppose it. Support for such bans was 62% among suburbanites, 74% among women in the suburbs and small cities, and 65% among white college graduates.But the survey found broad opposition to banning semi-automatic assault weapons among the core elements of Trump’s coalition — 67% among Republicans, 67% among conservatives, 65% among white men without college degrees, and 51% among rural Americans.Gun VotersThe party’s longstanding opposition to gun control is a product of party leaders working to consolidate single-issue firearms voters who reliably turn out in elections and tend to view any new restrictions as a threat to their Second Amendment rights.It explains why most Republicans oppose even modest measures like universal background checks, which received 89% national support in the Marist poll, including large majorities across all demographic and party affiliations. The NRA opposes that proposal, too.“The NRA is committed to the safe and lawful use of firearms by those exercising their Second Amendment freedoms,” the NRA said in a statement Sunday, adding that it “will not participate in the politicizing of these tragedies” but will work to pursue practical solutions.Earlier this year, eight House Republicans from suburban or competitive districts voted with Democrats to pass a bill that would impose background checks on buyers for gun sales considered private, which are not currently required by federal law.But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, has refused to consider the bill, and Trump has threatened to veto it.In a statement Monday, Trump denounced the “twisted” killers over the weekend and called for new “red flag” laws to keep firearms away from people found to be dangerous. He blamed the internet, social media and violent video games for pushing people toward violence, though he suggested easy access to guns wasn’t the problem.“Mental illness and hatred pulls the trigger, not the gun,” he said.Gun politics have shifted since President Barack Obama avoided the issue in his 2008 and 2012 campaigns for fear that it was a political loser. During Obama’s first term, the country was evenly divided on whether gun laws should be made stricter or stay the same, according to Gallup. By October 2018, support for stricter firearm laws outnumbered support for maintaining them by 31 points.Background ChecksThe shift was propelled by the Newtown elementary school massacre in December 2012, after which Senate Democratic leaders attempted to pass a bipartisan bill to require universal background checks, but were thwarted by a coalition of mostly Republicans.Senator Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, the Republican co-author of the bill, said Monday he spoke with Trump and urged him to support the measure, adding that the president expressed openness to work on background check legislation.Toomey said he hoped that “the accumulated pain from so many of these horrific experiences will be motivation to do something.”“I hope we’re at a moment where the atmosphere has changed,” Toomey told reporters.Senator Mitt Romney of Utah, the party’s 2012 presidential nominee, signaled openness to new gun laws on Sunday and said he wants to be a “constructive voice” in the debate.“These issues involve constitutional rights and deeply held beliefs – but that is not an excuse to shy away from a serious, fact-based, and thorough national discussion which will potentially lead to remedial legislation,” he said.Michael Bloomberg, owner of Bloomberg LP, the parent company of Bloomberg News, founded and helps fund Everytown for Gun Safety, a nonprofit that advocates for gun control measures.(Updates with GOP strategist on 2016 in seventh, eighth paragraphs.)To contact the reporter on this story: Sahil Kapur in Washington at skapur39@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Wendy Benjaminson at wbenjaminson@bloomberg.net, Laurie AsséoFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.

https://ift.tt/2Kk0cZx

[lovehardenemycollector]

(Bloomberg) -- After two gruesome mass shootings in a 24-hour span, some Republicans are raising alarms that their opposition to new firearm limits is making the party toxic to the suburban women and college graduates who will shape the 2020 election.“Republicans are headed for extinction in the suburbs if they don’t distance themselves from the NRA. The GOP needs to put forth solutions to help eradicate the gun violence epidemic,” said Dan Eberhart, a Republican donor and oil-and-gas executive who supports President Donald Trump.Last year, Eberhart said, he was having lunch with Rick Scott when the then-Florida governor learned of the massacre unfolding in Parkland. It marked the deadliest high school shooting in U.S. history, as a gunman used an AR-15-style rifle to kill 17 people. Eighteen months later, as the country reels from killing sprees in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, Eberhart said it’s time to join Democrats and majorities of Americans who want to ban those types of guns.“The GOP needs to make several moves such as universal background checks, eliminating loopholes and banning military-style assault weapons to neutralize the issue,” he said. “Otherwise, Republicans will lose suburban voters just like they did in the midterms on health care.”While most Republicans have opposed expanding background checks and banning assault-rifles, GOP Senator Lindsey Graham said Monday he cut a deal with Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal on “red flag” legislation to assist and encourage states to keep guns away from people who are found to pose an imminent risk of violence. Many Democrats said that wasn’t enough and called for a renewal of the assault-weapons ban and universal background checks, among other measures.The 2018 election reflected a changing landscape on guns. Republicans were swept out of the House majority after losing suburban bastions where they were once dominant — in places like Orange County, California, and around Dallas and Houston in Texas. Voters in 2018 favored stricter gun control by a margin of 22 percentage points, and those who did backed Democrats by a margin of 76% to 22%, according to exit polls. Gun policy ranked as the No. 4 concern, and voters who cited it as their top issue voted for Democrats by a margin of 70% to 29%.And the mood has changed since 2016.The gun issue propelled Trump in key states like Florida, Ohio, North Carolina and Pennsylvania among voters who opposed Democratic nominee Hillary Rodham Clinton’s support for gun control, said Republican strategist Brad Todd, whose firm polled on the issue. Todd said swing voters may still “see upsides and downsides to both approaches” on gun policy.There have been 255 mass shootings so far this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive, which counts incidents where at least four people were shot or killed, not including the shooter. With the presidential election 15 months away, it’s unclear just how salient the issue of guns will be in shaping voter behavior.GOP ‘Takes a Hit’The renewed debate captures a dilemma for Trump as he revs up his re-election campaign with appeals to rural Americans steeped in a rich gun culture. But he risks alienating upper-income suburbanites, who can make or break his prospects, if he’s seen as unwilling to take action to stop frequent mass shootings.All of the major Democratic candidates are running on gun control measures, including tougher background checks and banning assault weapons, setting up a stark contrast with Trump.“Every time the country experiences a tragedy of this nature the Republican brand takes a hit,” said Carlos Curbelo, a Republican former congressman who lost his suburban Miami-area district to a Democrat in 2018. “Because many, many Americans perceive that Republicans are unwilling to act on gun reform, due to the influence of the NRA and other organizations.”“Certainly in swing suburban districts there is broad support for” policies like universal background checks and 72-hour waiting periods, Curbelo said. “A lot of voters, especially young voters, have lost their patience with this issue.”A Marist poll last month, commissioned by NPR and PBS, found that 57% of American adults support banning “the sale of semi-automatic assault guns such as the AK-47 or the AR-15,” while 41% oppose it. Support for such bans was 62% among suburbanites, 74% among women in the suburbs and small cities, and 65% among white college graduates.But the survey found broad opposition to banning semi-automatic assault weapons among the core elements of Trump’s coalition — 67% among Republicans, 67% among conservatives, 65% among white men without college degrees, and 51% among rural Americans.Gun VotersThe party’s longstanding opposition to gun control is a product of party leaders working to consolidate single-issue firearms voters who reliably turn out in elections and tend to view any new restrictions as a threat to their Second Amendment rights.It explains why most Republicans oppose even modest measures like universal background checks, which received 89% national support in the Marist poll, including large majorities across all demographic and party affiliations. The NRA opposes that proposal, too.“The NRA is committed to the safe and lawful use of firearms by those exercising their Second Amendment freedoms,” the NRA said in a statement Sunday, adding that it “will not participate in the politicizing of these tragedies” but will work to pursue practical solutions.Earlier this year, eight House Republicans from suburban or competitive districts voted with Democrats to pass a bill that would impose background checks on buyers for gun sales considered private, which are not currently required by federal law.But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, has refused to consider the bill, and Trump has threatened to veto it.In a statement Monday, Trump denounced the “twisted” killers over the weekend and called for new “red flag” laws to keep firearms away from people found to be dangerous. He blamed the internet, social media and violent video games for pushing people toward violence, though he suggested easy access to guns wasn’t the problem.“Mental illness and hatred pulls the trigger, not the gun,” he said.Gun politics have shifted since President Barack Obama avoided the issue in his 2008 and 2012 campaigns for fear that it was a political loser. During Obama’s first term, the country was evenly divided on whether gun laws should be made stricter or stay the same, according to Gallup. By October 2018, support for stricter firearm laws outnumbered support for maintaining them by 31 points.Background ChecksThe shift was propelled by the Newtown elementary school massacre in December 2012, after which Senate Democratic leaders attempted to pass a bipartisan bill to require universal background checks, but were thwarted by a coalition of mostly Republicans.Senator Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, the Republican co-author of the bill, said Monday he spoke with Trump and urged him to support the measure, adding that the president expressed openness to work on background check legislation.Toomey said he hoped that “the accumulated pain from so many of these horrific experiences will be motivation to do something.”“I hope we’re at a moment where the atmosphere has changed,” Toomey told reporters.Senator Mitt Romney of Utah, the party’s 2012 presidential nominee, signaled openness to new gun laws on Sunday and said he wants to be a “constructive voice” in the debate.“These issues involve constitutional rights and deeply held beliefs – but that is not an excuse to shy away from a serious, fact-based, and thorough national discussion which will potentially lead to remedial legislation,” he said.Michael Bloomberg, owner of Bloomberg LP, the parent company of Bloomberg News, founded and helps fund Everytown for Gun Safety, a nonprofit that advocates for gun control measures.(Updates with GOP strategist on 2016 in seventh, eighth paragraphs.)To contact the reporter on this story: Sahil Kapur in Washington at skapur39@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Wendy Benjaminson at wbenjaminson@bloomberg.net, Laurie AsséoFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://ift.tt/2Kk0cZx