A new government report has revealed that there are thousands of lottery winners in Michigan that were still receiving welfare. The Huffington Post reported that 14 percent of lottery winners in Michigan were receiving welfare benefits or living with welfare recipients, according to Michigan's Department of Human Services.
The Huffington Post reported that those winners, some of which only got jackpots as small as $1,000 could lose their benefits. The report found out that there are nearly 3,500 lottery winners that are getting welfare in the state.
The report has come out after a law that was enacted last year, that requires the Michigan Lottery to check its database of those that received a winning of more than $1000 to the list of welfare recipients.
"The report's findings come a little more than a year after the state enacted large-scale cuts to its welfare programs. The cuts caused the families of 46,000 children to lose cash assistance in the state, and critics alleged that such cuts were forcing needy families to turn to food banks and other non-profits for assistance," reported The Huffington Post.
The law was passed after two cases were seen of jackpot lottery winners collecting welfare benefits. A man in 2011 for example was still using food stamps, despite winning a $2 million lottery.
"Human Services Director Maura Corrigan says some lottery winners are no longer getting public assistance because of the law signed a year ago. But she says "loopholes" still let lottery winners collect some Medicaid benefits," reported The Detroit Free Press. "The law requires asset tests to determine eligibility for public assistance. Lawmakers passed it after a Bay County man used food stamps despite winning $850,000."
Corrigan said to Detroitnews.com that her department could only remove 565 of the lottery winnersf rom welfare because of loopholes in "federal asset-testing requirements and rules for cutting off assistance for individuals on public health care programs."
Corrigon said to Detroitnews.com that she is recommending Michigan to use a law similar to New York that allows the state to intercept lottery winnings from lottery winners to repay taxpayers. She said, "To me, that's an area that would be worthy for the Michigan Legislature to pursue."
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