Undercover Scientist

Lets start at the beginning, that’s a very good place to start. When you read you begin with ABC, when you are changing your life, you begin with food. I just finished the application for food assistance here in Dubuque. It was through the state Department of Human Services.

Just trying to find the place to go was a struggle.

To find out where to go, I first googled “how to get food stamps in Dubuque, Iowa.” This search was full of roadblocks and dead ends. The “Keystone Area Education Agency” website had resources with names and phone numbers, but with no address for the Human Services (rather than the android services most states provide) here in Dubuque. It just had a P.O. box #. The first two links offered were both linked to guides.gottrouble.com. The “Got Trouble” website had useful information, about food stamps and food assistance, information on how widely it is needed, but when you click on the link “Qualifying for Food Assistance” it takes you back to the same page you are on but with no information to direct service.

There is a link to the Iowa State website and you can apply on line (if you have access to the internet) but when you fill out the application, it says it will take a whole day to process. I chose to walk-in thinking it would be faster.

A co-worker overheard me talking about my need to get on food assistance and gave me a “Dubuque County Family Resource Guild” and I looked up “Food Programs.” This place had an address and phone number, so I called them to find out where they were located.

The woman on the phone sounded startled. I asked her about how I can apply for stamps and she suggested online. It is an assumption that any person who calls would have access to the internet. Even the state made this assumption by posting their application online. I asked how I could do it in person. She said I could fill out the application in their office. I asked here where they were located, and she told me the Nessel Building. I don’t know where that was, so I asked what the major cross street was. She said it was 8^th st. They are on the 4^th floor, but no suite number was given. I asked her what else I should bring when I come and she said any check stubs I have, so I had to explain that I wouldn’t be paid until December 10^th. She also suggested any bank statements I may have. While I understand their need for this information, I am embarrassed by my lack of money in my accounts, and sometimes they are deficit money. It hurt just to have her ask and know I would have to share that information with someone. I printed out my bank statement from last month, but it doesn’t accurately reflect my position now because it doesn’t take into account my moving expenses (all in the last 2 weeks) or my trip to Chicago of which I haven’t been reimbursed for, yet. The office was luckily on the same block as the building I am working in, so I shuffled over to it in the cold.

When I got to the building, it was intimidating. The building was almost desolate. It was missing any human art. Just walls and doors with numbers on them. The sign in the lobby said the suite I was looking for was 410, but didn’t give any indication of what the office did. If I was looking for help I would have to know what I was doing. There was no direction to any stairs leading up, just a stairwell leading down. I went towards the elevator as my quickest route and the one clearest to me. For this there was a sign.

When you arrive on the 4^th floor, you are immediately greeted with a wall and a door. That’s it. When you enter through the door, on your left is a door with a paper sign that says “Employees Only” to a what would seem like, an employee lounge with a refrigerator. In another door to your left is a door with another printed sign on florescent paper that reads “Private Office.” So far, I feel excluded.

The room to the right of which the other doors attach is large with 3 rows of 5 chairs facing north. The chairs are those 1960s plastic chairs, like something you’d see in a school. There is a long table against the left side of the room with an array of used children’s books. I noticed a very used Pokemon comic. There was also a video cassette. There may have been a tv and vcr in the room but I didn’t notice it right away. To the northern-most right-hand side is a plexi-glass window with one window in it. A paper sign says “report to receptionist” or some sort of other direction like that. The room was empty, and although it had activities for children and waiting adults in it, it felt empty. The blankness of the walls, and the absence of any life in the room made the place feel dead.

I went up to the window and told the very tanned receptionist I was wondering about food assistance and asked her where I should apply. She pointed to her left (my right) and said to fill out the application, the pink and the orange. There were plastic attachments to the wall with a paper sign on them saying “Applications” though not telling exactly what. I took one out of the bin and asked if this was the right one. The application was the size of a notepad and it was bound the same way, by a wax seal across the top like a notepad. It was also stapled on the top left hand corner. She said I could fill it out here or take it home. It felt like she said “you can take it and go.” Meanwhile the phone was ringing off the hook but she was polite enough to address me and let the phone ring. I said I’d prefer to fill it out here and took it to a small table with magazines on it.

The information they wanted was basic but I had more questions than I later asked. Of course it wanted my name, Social Security Number, and a phone number for me. It also asked by my “house.” For me, this was interesting, I don’t know if my roommates are counted as people in “my house.” We live together, but we pay rent individually. No one in my house is financially connected to me. I don’t feed them, they don’t feed me. I wasn’t sure if I should write them down, but decided not to because it would make things more complicated, not less. I was thinking about how to quickly get this process over with so I could have enough food for this weekend.

The other thing I noticed on the application was that they made it very clear if I filled out anything wrong intentionally, it was perjury, and I could be sent to jail. You have to be very careful but there was no one there to ask questions about the nuances with. It was very intimidating. The second thing it made reference to often was that you had to be a U.S. citizen, and that anyone you were applying for or on behalf of, also had to be U.S. citizens. I wondered where their skepticism of me came from. And why the suspicion of me? Is there data that shows this is a problem with assistance fraud? I was on the suspicion end of things, not the questioning end, and it didn’t apply to me, but who does it apply to? Do 2 questions on a form stop fraud effectively?

I filled out the application, but may have written the incorrect date. I thought it was the 22^nd. It is the 23^rd. I corrected it because, while the date doesn’t mean much to me, to them it is the day forward for which the food will be allocated from. To an organization, the contract date is between me and the system.

The pink and the orange parts. When she said the pink and orange application, I thought the pages would have been pink and orange, but it was the headings that were color coded. One color was just a generic application of the department. It was getting your name in the system. The other coded section was just applying for food assistance, and the information they wanted to look that over.

The woman who took my application looked it over quickly. She noticed one section wasn’t finished, so I filled that part out quickly and handed it back.

I wanted to ask, if there would be an application fee, because I’m an ass; really it is because I wanted to confirm there would be no more further cost. When I don’t have money, I want to make sure I won’t be charged. Before heading over to the office, I realized I didn’t have a copy of my Social Security Card. I had lost it this summer in MN. To get a copy of my SS card, It is going to cost like $3 and they will want to see my birth certificate (not a copy). I don’t have a birth certificate; my dad has it in a fire-proof box back in Idaho. I was going to get one for myself, but just to get one from the county I was born in will cost upwards of $15. Paperwork cost money. I will have to invest in this at some time, but that is for when I start getting paid, unless an emergency comes first. If they need a copy of my social security card to move along with the process, I’ll expedite my attempt.

I asked what if she needed anything else from me. She asked what I had? I offered her my bank statement with the caveat that it isn’t correct/current. I then asked what I should do. She said that it would take a day to process, and a person would call me to do an interview since I had a phone number and address on the form. I asked her when this would be. She looked over at the calendar and said, “well with the holiday, it will be next week.”

Next to the calendar where it said “Holiday” written on this Thursday and Friday, was a flier for a food pantry. I asked if there was anyway to get help before next week, and she said “no.” I felt like I was being lied to. It hurt. I quickly left and went back through the empty hallways back to the street.

While my experience doesn’t end on the street back to the warm office I am in now, I wanted to get down initial impressions. From the Nesel Building (as I now know it to be) I went over to the Northern Iowa Community College extension building. I just wanted to check it out but was in no mood to try and communicate with people there or try to get back into work mode. But some of the contrasts between the two offices couldn’t help but be clearer from the time.

The NICC building was across the street. When I walked in, there was a small reception area with padded seating and lots of information on the walls. The receptionist/gate keepers still sat behind a plexi-glass window, but she was chatting with other people and the laughter, and good spirit was quickly identified. I didn’t make eye contact because I was afraid I would have to explain myself, so instead just explored the hallways and information available to any stranger who would walk in. It was a nice building, clean and with lots of pictures on the walls. Some of the photographs were of students with slogans about working hard, and education takes persistence. They looked like they had been hand-made by someone and were well done. I never found a flier or information on what they do in that place. I know there was part of the building, not for the public, because of the door and receptionist/gatekeeper. I wondered what was behind that door but was not in the mood to go exploring, because someone just lied to me and was willing to make me go hungry over the Thanksgiving Holiday, a person who just explained to them that they were new in town.

I could have been hungry for weeks, living in my car, and she just judged me as unworthy of help. That’s what hurts. I took action to do something, and there was no re-action on the other end. I am not use to that. Now I have to sit and stew for a week before anything else happens. They say people living in poverty need persistence and patience. This is why.