patrick.net

upisdown says

Wrong, as usual. Here's the link to the MA site that says SPECIFICALLY what can't be bought or things paid for with the EBT card.

and the reality is far different. remarkable some ignore widespread fraud.

Food stamp fraud on rise in Brockton, across state

http://www.enterprisenews.com/answerbook/brockton/x2053821980/Food-stamp-fraud-on-rise

“This trafficking EBT cards has become a professional crime ring here in Massachusetts and I’m sure all over the country as well,” state Rep. Shaunna O’Connell, R-Taunton, said Friday. “I think the abuse is far more widespread than anyone knows of at this point.”

On Thursday, state police detectives assigned to the Middleton’s office assisted Brockton police in executing five search warrants and eight arrest warrants for trafficking food stamps and larceny.

The stores involved and charged with trafficking food stamps were 28 Corner Convenience (B&D Mart), 95 Montello St.; JP Communications, 69 North Montello St.; Lucky Dollar, 284 North Main St.; Rice’s Market, 769 North Main St.; and Dip N Sip, 235 North Main St.

The investigation found the store owners and clerks were engaging in a scheme that involved illegally exchanging food stamps for cash, according to the district attorney’s office.

On several occasions since May, undercover officers would go into the stores and present electronic benefit transfer (EBT) cards to the clerk. The clerk would swipe the customer’s card, pretending the customer bought groceries and then give them cash, said authorities.

For example, if the EBT customer wanted $50 cash, the store owner would swipe the card for $100, which would be credited to the store, and then give the customer the cash in exchange.

remarkable....

Report: Thousands of dead people receiving food stamps

http://www.examiner.com/article/report-thousands-of-dead-people-receiving-food-stamps

According to a report released by Senator James Coburn (R-OK), approximately 2,000 dead people in New York and Massachusetts are receiving food stamps, CNS News reported Thursday.

"The USDA Inspector General found roughly 2,000 dead people are still receiving food stamps in New York and Massachusetts combined," the report said, citing USDA findings from April and June 2012.

Yea, truly remarkable, because after a year of inactivity(per the Mass. site that I linked to above), they automatically are un-enrolled from the system. So, who is still using the card then?

LOL, Are you just plain stupid, or just really slow?

upisdown says

Especially considering that most of the fraud in food stamps is by the vendors
over-charging/double billing, or adding on extra fees.

And here's what I posted on Friday about food stamp fraud.

thomaswong.1986 says

The stores involved and charged with trafficking food stamps were 28 Corner
Convenience (B&D Mart), 95 Montello St.; JP Communications, 69 North
Montello St.; Lucky Dollar, 284 North Main St.; Rice’s Market, 769 North Main
St.; and Dip N Sip, 235 North Main St.

The investigation found the store owners and clerks were engaging in a scheme
that involved illegally exchanging food stamps for cash, according to the
district attorney’s office.

thomaswong.1986 says

Report: Thousands of dead people receiving food stamps

The REAL problem isn't the Tsaernaev Welfare Babies, it's the fact it is a government conspiracy from top to bottom. Their financial support is just the first layer of the onion.

upisdown says

Wrong, as usual. Here's the link to the MA site that says SPECIFICALLY what
can't be bought or things paid for with the EBT card.

wrong you are - again. The EBT can be used to access fucking CASH. With CASH you do what you want. No need to lie. Own it.

Here's your first post of nonsense where YOU claimed that the EBT card was supposedly used for:

Bap33 says

And the EBT cards have been used on vacations, casinos, and strip clubs. Deal
with it.

Then after I proved you to be a lyin' sack of shit, you change your dogma to somehow cover your ass, although that opportunity is long gone. Who didn't see THAT coming? LOL

Bap33 says

wrong you are - again. The EBT can be used to access fucking CASH. With CASH you
do what you want. No need to lie. Own

I almost forgot who, or what more like, I really was dealing with. Oh well, the post count is up to 74 now, and it's mostly populated with moronic poo. You're vindicated.

http://www.wfsb.com/story/20085789/state-issued-debit-cards-used-at-atms-at-bars-casinos-strip-clubs

Bap33 says

http://www.wfsb.com/story/20085789/state-issued-debit-cards-used-at-atms-at-bars-casinos-strip-clubs

Wrong state, dumbass. Why am I not surprised.

But did you bother to see what else is done with state-issued debit cards??

State Tax Refunds To Be Issued In Form Of Debit Cards Instead Of Checks

http://connecticut.cbslocal.com/2012/01/30/state-tax-refunds-to-be-issued-in-form-of-debit-cards-instead-of-checks/

From the article:
Instead of refund checks, this year Connecticut state income taxpayers who decide against having the refund deposited directly into their bank accounts will receive debit cards, instead.

upisdown says

they automatically are un-enrolled from the system.

so the auditors found the opposite to be true.. dead are still enrolled in the system.

how do you explain this ?

thomaswong.1986 says

http://www.examiner.com/article/report-thousands-of-dead-people-receiving-food-stamps

According to a report released by Senator James Coburn (R-OK), approximately
2,000 dead people in New York and Massachusetts are receiving food stamps, CNS
News reported Thursday.

"The USDA Inspector General found roughly 2,000 dead people are still
receiving food stamps in New York and Massachusetts combined," the report said,
citing USDA findings from April and June 2012.

It's not on me to prove anything, it's on YOU because YOU made the claim.
Here's the paste from the Mass site:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

How do I use my SNAP EBT card?
To use your SNAP EBT card to pay for food at the food store checkout, slide your card through the card reader, then enter your four-digit Personal Identification Number (PIN) on the keypad and press the "Enter" or "OK" button. This automatically subtracts the cost of your food from your SNAP food stamps EBT account. (If the store does not have a card reader or it is not working, the cashier can fill out a form for you to sign.)

Whenever you buy food with your card, your receipt will show the amount of money left in your SNAP EBT account. You can also call EBT Customer Service at 1-800-997-2555 to get your EBT balance.

Note: Massachusetts does not yet have online access to personal EBT information such as transactions or EBT balance. For updates, see Online EBT SNAP Accounts on the USDA web site.

If you do not use all of your SNAP benefits for a month, they will carry over to the next month. However, if you do not use any of your SNAP food stamps for a full year, DTA will assume you do not need SNAP food stamps and will cancel any benefits still in your account.

If you have any problem with your EBT card, you should call EBT Customer Service at 1-800-997-2555.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://www.massresources.org/snap-use-benefits.html

upisdown says

It's not on me to prove anything, it's on YOU because YOU made the claim

and here you have it...

"The USDA Inspector General found roughly 2,000 dead people are still
receiving food stamps in New York and Massachusetts combined," the report said,
citing USDA findings from April and June 2012.

You fail to understand the system was 'hacked' and controls bypassed to allow abuse
to occur. So instead of fixing it .. you look the other way.

upisdown says

Wrong state, dumbass. Why am I not surprised.

got me on that one. wrong state. A simple google with 80K results and I picked the wrong one, my bad. The abuse is nation wide, dipshit.

Anyways, I'm in mexifornia, and the EBT abuse here is absurd. The local bar (and grill) has an ATM that cashes out EBT ... and the scum just walk into the bar with cash. My buddy runs one area supermarket and he had to post on the doors that only $50 cash will be given to EBT scum, because they would hit him at 12:01am and take all his cash. So, cash access is a reality in mexifornia.

Now, are you suggesting the scum in your state do not access cash with their card?

More Arrests In Boston Bombing Case – Surprisingly, None Of Them Tea Party Members...

- Much to the chagrin of HuffPo, Salon, etal....

http://michaelgraham.com/more-arrests-in-boston-bombing-case-surprisingly-none-of-them-tea-party-members/

....."UPDATE! One of Tsarnaev’s pals traveled to US from Kazakhstan without a visa–we still let him in. Yeah, President Obama, Homeland Security’s doing a heck of a job!"

thomaswong.1986 says

You fail to understand the system was 'hacked' and controls bypassed to allow
abuse
to occur. So instead of fixing it .. you look the other way.

No, you were being intentionally deceptive, otherwise you wouldn't have "conveniently" left out the info about the system being hacked.
Lying, deception, it's all the same and you morons never hesitate to dabble in either of them, and in a sick distorted way use either to make any point and don't see that it taints your words.

thomaswong.1986 says

and here you have it...

"The USDA Inspector General found roughly 2,000 dead people are still

receiving food stamps in New York and Massachusetts combined," the report said,

citing USDA findings from April and June 2012.

You fail to understand the system was 'hacked' and controls bypassed to allow abuse

to occur. So instead of fixing it .. you look the other way.

-----------------------
Thomas,

I'm finding certain folks on this forum can't stand the fact that some welfare systems are very flawed, and need imrpovement. They can't fathom that a gov't entity needs fixing or is inept. AND what I find hilarious is that they believe that everyone who is on the dole is an angel. If you disagree, then you are a neo-fascist/racist/blablabla. They don't like efforts to confirm that welfare recipients are all angels are 'good people'....

Improvement should always be an agenda, because nothing and nobody is perfect. So when we bring up some facts and examples of things that are obviously broken, the few (not all) lefties don't want to shed some light and discuss; they'd rather lie about what you said/wrote, call you names, and basically act like adolescent monkees flinging shit at each other.

Bap33 says

got me on that one. wrong state. A simple google with 80K results and I picked
the wrong one, my bad.

I wasn't surprised, because useless lyin assholes like you go straight to that mode from the beginning.
You right wing shitbags are so predictable in your dogma, and the inevitable follow-up of BS.

When are you going to claim to be some sort of victim?

Bap33 says

Now, are you suggesting the scum in your state do not access cash with their
card?

No dumbass, you are. Why is that BS the s.o.p. for you hacks?

You want to know how I know of the workings of those systems in MY state? Because a friend of mine takes the EBT card for food stamps at his store(it varies, but about 40% of his business), and showed me a reciept that had the current balance on it for a customer that he had just rung up. He was afraid of any backlash by that customer or others that he knew, and so didn't want to do any follow up on it.

So, I called the number for vendor problems, and as I help him out sometimes when he's busy like during the holidays, I told them my(his/our) concerns as an employee about the huge balance that was on that card, and it seemed unusual and thought that maybe some notice should be brought to it because of potential fraud.

THAT'S how I learned about the EBT card and it's many uses, along with a private network that must be pre-approved and other things, not by listening to BS and anecdotal dogma that's constantly passed around amongst the morons.

Is there fraud, abuse, and misuse? Yes, and it's small and mostly committed by the VENDORS, not the recipients. The EBT card cut down a lot of that, even though the big banks now get to profit from the whole system.

The whole system has enough flaws and glitches that anybody against the system does not need to resort to any lies and anecdotes to make it somehow sound worse than it actually is. Try using facts next time, maybe you won't look so bad trying to make your point.

AverageBear says

So when we bring up some facts and examples of things that are obviously
broken, the few

You have yet to show any, and your intention was deceptive from the beginning, as I proven you to be both a liar and a moron. I asked for proof of your claims and you (of course there was not any)didn't provide any, and then I continued to disprove your intentional lies.

Try facts sometime, because there are many when it comes to this issue, and resorting to lies is counter-productive to your ideological driven agenda.

AverageBear says

Thomas,

I'm finding certain folks on this forum can't stand the fact that some welfare systems are very flawed, and need imrpovement. They can't fathom that a gov't entity needs fixing or is inept. AND what I find hilarious is that they believe that everyone who is on the dole is an angel. If you disagree, then you are a neo-fascist/racist/blablabla. They don't like efforts to confirm that welfare recipients are all angels are 'good people'...

very often you find they benefit from the fraud and have no desire to see it changed to stop the fraud..

thomaswong.1986 says

very often you find they benefit from the fraud and have no desire to see it changed to stop the fraud..

Ridiculous. Of course fraud should stop, positing otherwise of your opponents is a smear tactic and a lie. I have a tangential connection to the California Death Registry. It may surprise you to know, that death is not an event that historically triggered automatic notification of the myriad of financial connections to a person. Society has traditionally concerned itself with births far more than deaths. We've usually placed much of the burden on family to carry around a death certificate with them and do it themselves. I expect that quite a lot of "dead still enrolled" in something has to do with simple fact the person died and the agency didn't get timely notice about it. You die, now is every county hospital and morgue supposed to hire staff to send letters to every agency, or what? What if you die a John Doe? What if you die while travelling, or have no family? How long does it take before every agency that has you on their rolls know about it? It's been a sticky problem for a long time but work is being done to solve it.

Vicente says

Ridiculous.

Hardly, its a typical profile. other items... thats why we need to issue US Citizen/Voter ID cards. makes plenty of common sense.

One of the most signifi cant
fi ndings of this survey is the
very large increase in cases
involving the exploitation
of weak internal controls by
fraudsters – up from 49 percent
in 2007 to 74 percent in 2011.

http://www.kpmg.com/CEE/en/IssuesAndInsights/ArticlesPublications/Documents/who-is-the-typical-fraudster.pdf#page=12

thomaswong.1986 says

Hardly, its a typical profile. other items... thats why we need to issue US Citizen/Voter ID cards. makes plenty of common sense.

So you cite a study about corporate fraud, to prove your point about EBT? Hmmmm well I guess if the country is run by bankster frauds, the example is certainly set so who can blame anyone else? Anyhow....

Use of Death Registries, nullifies the entire problem. Grandma can't keep cashing Grandpa's check in the first place, if all agencies are notified automatically.

Vicente says

So you cite a study about corporate fraud, to prove your point about EBT? Hmmmm well I guess if the country is run by bankster frauds, the example is certainly set so who can blame anyone else? Anyhow....

are processes for cash disbursements any different between government vs industry ?

of course they are not ! Self justifcation to allow fraud to continue is often indicated when you hear
comments such as... "Bankster frauds" Those are the people who are the highest risk.

Vicente says

Use of Death Registries, nullifies the entire problem. Grandma can't keep cashing Grandpa's check in the first place, if all agencies are notified automatically.

Govt dont use centralized registry for all its various departments. Its a myth... Its a mix bag of old, new running on different OS platforms and often dont talk to each other. CA is one of the worst. All the spending increases went to salaries and benefits and little went to IT capital HW & SW purchases.. talk to any Oracle sales rep who focus on Govt clients..

thomaswong.1986 says

are processes for cash disbursements any different between government vs industry ?

So if corporate fraud is rampant and increasing, as your study posits, why I should expect welfare fraud & errors to be going the opposite direction? It seems to me if you have a society filled with frauds, well then.... perhaps you just see fraud and criminality behind every bush.

I'd rather expect KPMG to find decreased fraud, given that we loosened accounting standards to "anything goes" levels lately. I suspect that KPMG tosses this study at their customers, to SELL them their services. LOOK your bushes are FILLED with commies, you need to hire KPMG to root them out!

Vicente says

Use of Death Registries, nullifies the entire problem. Grandma can't keep
cashing Grandpa's check in the first place, if all agencies are notified
automatically.

Most states do have those registries, to include MA. The county coroner in most states issues the death certificate and it is forwarded to the sec. of state's office. Does anybody actually know for a fact that those registries aren't referenced when people apply for benefits? Then again, if the elderly die off throughout the year, it can take weeks for the state to get the death certificate due to numerous reasons, and due to staffing and such why would any personel constantly check the benefit recipients to see who has died. Maybe some sort of database that automatically flags the benefits when a social security number from the sec of state's office posts the death certificate.
Or something as simple as lowering the time frame for inactivity to 6 months from a year, but that would be entirely dependent upon staffing levels.

thomaswong.1986 says

talk to any Oracle sales rep who focus on Govt clients..

I don't see why an Oracle rep would know facts behind declining govt sales. Personally we use less and less Oracle because it's too frigging expensive and they keep changing the price structure to squeeze more blood out of the stone.

Vicente says

I'd rather expect KPMG to find decreased fraud, given that we loosened accounting standards to "anything goes" levels lately. I suspect that KPMG tosses this study at their customers, to SELL them their services. LOOK your bushes are FILLED with commies, you need to hire KPMG to root them out!

Thats right.. you need an independent party to root out the fraud.. they are better experts at it. Govt things they are above the law and therefore can get away with anything.

thats why Govt employees fear audits by outside auditors...they cant BS anymore!

finehoe says

Obviously the MA welfare agency needs complete and comprehensive investigative powers over every resident of the state so that every person is subject to a no-holds-barred background check.

no... investigations should be by separate independent entity... frankly shouldnt be a govt agency and should be made public... including criminal charges for weakness of controls.

if its good for private industry (SOX) should be good for public govt workers.

Vicente says

I don't see why an Oracle rep would know facts behind declining govt sales.

they saw all the govt system shit imaginable and can easily compare better working systems (best practices) utilized by private industry (corporations).

A clear as night and day...

thomaswong.1986 says

Vicente says

I don't see why an Oracle rep would know facts behind declining govt sales.

they saw all the govt system shit imaginable and can easily compare better working systems (best practices) utilized by private industry (corporations).

A clear as night and day...

What unbelievable irrelevant horseshit. Sales reps know jack except sales. You think they also know my budget and internal operations, Oracle employees really are all seeing Oracles. I should consult one to find out what color my next child's eyes will be. You certainly are good at redirecting into dead ends, congrats.

Vicente says

What unbelievable irrelevant horseshit.

Good governance.. matters! Ask your auditor!

Vicente says

Oracle employees really are all seeing Oracles. I should consult one to find out what color my next child's eyes will be. You certainly are good at redirecting into dead ends, congrats.

Its no secret a sales person who walks into an operation to provide assessment as part of a engagement will be exposed to all the dirty laundry and issues.. and there have been and continue to be lots of dirty laundry when it comes to govt operations. They are badly run and mismanaged.

Why else do vendors salespeople and sales engineers have to sign a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) as part of the engagement with their clients.

30 years of tech industry experience and i have seen it all.

here is another state with equal problems, therefore ripe for fraud. you certainly dont hear about these horror stories from private industry.

Audit rips state for botching, mismanaging $50M computer contract

http://www.freep.com/article/20120719/NEWS06/120719032/secretary-of-state-computer-contract-problems

LANSING – An auditor’s report released today rips the Department of Technology, Management and Budget for mismanaging a decade-old computer project for the Secretary of State that has cost taxpayers $50 million and still isn’t finished.

The state used a flawed bidding process and a badly worded contract, then paid bills it shouldn’t have and failed to penalize contractors when deadlines were missed and systems did not work correctly, Auditor General Thomas McTavish said in the scathing report.

State officials provided incomplete and inaccurate information to the Legislature about how much the project was costing and how it was progressing, McTavish said.

The review of the Business Application Modernization Project documents the latest in a series of state government computer projects that have featured missed deadlines, cost overruns and failures to deliver what was promised.

California: Computer mess jeopardizes court's political clout Opponents call project ill-conceived, mismanaged, failed

http://www.legalnews.com/detroit/896358

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- Former California Chief Justice Ron George's crowning achievement was expected to be his crusade to drag the nation's largest court system into the 21st century: a computer system linking every courthouse in the state's 58 counties.

As initially envisioned a decade ago, anyone in any courthouse today should be able to get real-time information on just about any case anywhere in the state.

Instead, the state auditor has concluded that court officials have so badly mismanaged the massive information technology project formally launched in 2004 that it has been installed to mixed reviews in just seven counties. And more than what may become a $2 billion computer project is at stake.

After spending billions, state remains hampered by outmoded, unreliable computer systems

An embarrassing legacy of cost overruns, botched upgrades and failed networking projects has left California to rely on decades-old technology and jury-rigged software systems.

http://articles.latimes.com/2009/nov/22/local/la-me-state-computers22-2009nov22

"It's embarrassing," said Tracy Westen, chief executive of the Center for Governmental Studies in Los Angeles. "If California can't get it right, who can?"

Among the computer flops:

* The wheezing, 1970s-vintage computer system that prints paychecks for the entire state workforce is held together by software patches and jury-rigged connections and is in danger of failing, according to officials in the state controller's office. A $130-million overhaul called the 21st Century Project was supposed to have been activated two years ago, but instead state officials have been locked in a lawsuit with the contractor and say it will now cost 39% more.

Welfare Fraud Still Plagues California JULY 5, 2011

http://www.calwatchdog.com/2011/07/05/welfare-fraud-still-plagues-california/

Vacations subsidized by fraud. Welfare to those not meeting work demands. Welfare cards used to buy coffin nails and fire water.

After such outrages, one might think the California Department of Social Services would reform itself. Especially at a time when the state can’t pay its own bills. Nope.

California is the leading welfare provider in the United States. It pays for the largest number of welfare fraud cases — with little sign of reversal. This wide-ranging fraud includes extracting welfare money from casinos and cruise ships, the failure of welfare recipients to meet work requirements, and filing false returns. What a mess.

Reported the Orange County Register, “California is nearly twice as big as New York state, but we have five times as many welfare cases.

According to the Public Policy Institute of California, our state is one of the only nine that does not enforce the federal government’s five year lifetime limit on cash welfare assistance. The monthly cash check is almost 70 percent higher than the national average.”

Why Did A High-Ranking Member of Gov. Patrick’s Office “Warn” Shaunna O’Connell About Criticizing Deval?

---------------------------------------------------------
http://michaelgraham.com/why-did-a-high-ranking-member-of-gov-patricks-office-warn-shaunna-oconnell-about-criticizing-deval/

-----------------------------------------------------------

...."Earlier today, Rep. Shaunna O’Connell got a phone call from a very senior member of the governor’s staff with a warning: Watch how you criticize Deval Patrick on the issue of welfare benefits for the Tsarnaev family.

The Governor was apparently upset by these comments from EBT reform leader O’Connell:

O’Connell complained that the “first instinct of the Patrick administration was to protect [the privacy rights of] terrorists,” by repeatedly fighting the release of EBT documents and records related to the Tsarnaev’s history of life on the dole in Massachusetts.

Clearly someone in the corner office didn’t like it.

“You said Governor Patrick was protecting terrorists. You shouldn’t be saying things like that in public,” the Governor’s aide warned O’Connell. “These are very sensitive issues.”

According to Rep. O’Connell, the governor’s representative seemed to be expecting an apology. One was not forthcoming.

I replied that the governor likes to pick and choose what laws he enforces, particularly on illegal immigration and welfare reform. For some reason in this case, the governor chose to use a questionable law to try and protect the privacy rights of these terrorists,” O’Connell told me.

“[The Governor's aide] didn’t like hearing that. She just kept telling me to stop saying the governor was protecting the rights of terrorists.”

So did some random member of Gov. Patrick’s team just call her out of the blue to complain, or was this a message directly from Deval.

“You’ll have to ask them,” O’Connell said. So I did.

I called the governor’s office and asked to speak to the person who made the warning call to O’Connell. That person refused to take my call, and transferred me to the press office. I told the receptionist why I was calling. She said they’d call back.

I’m still waiting.

Can you trolls get any more moronic?

You have to stand in AWE of people who insist that there is sekrit inflation, that the #1 cause of deficits is the piddling amount we spend on AFDC/WIC relative to "Defense", and that widespread unionization is hurting our competitiveness, and if we just slashed wages in half we'd have this megaboom.

Even more important, welfare creates big, sleazy, pork barrel government bureaucracies to oversee the giveaways. People paid with jobs and benefits to give away taxpayer money. Once established and unionized, these bureaucracies become vocal, self perpetuating constituencies. It's like giving yourself a metastasizing disease and wondering why you don't get better.

My wife and I passed a Social Security/benefits/assistance office and laughed, take the citizenship oath in one room and step over to the next to start picking up your checks. Put GPS microchips on the money and you can get the liquor stores/betting parlors/drug dealers to light up like Christmas lights on a computer monitor.

Wealthy immigrants are over here like crazy, with assets hidden in foreign countries/ accounts, sucking on our welfare tits and laughing at us.

How are you on welfare, or going to school, and are able to take six month "vacation" to Russia?
Maybe we should create jihadist save haven cities here just to show what nice people we are.

upisdown says

Bap33
says

Now, are you suggesting the scum in your state do not access cash with
their
card?

No dumbass, you are. Why is that BS the s.o.p. for you hacks?

can you put down the bong long enough to read what I wrote? No? Your mom wont stop bugging you to take out the garbage huh? Go hug your Lord Barry life size doll (w/anatomic correct accessories) and have a nice post-dope-smoke nap.

EBT accesses cash -- green backs -- and that cash is used however the welfare taker wishes .... the spoils of a job well done. If you say no, then I shall be forced to shame you, scallywag.