If we can work with the State of Massachusetts, we hope to automate the calculations of benefit amounts. This system could be a model for other States and might even help create the foundation on which the algorithms of other States could be built.
Unfortunately, because of lack of resources, our work has been held up so far. Without access to people who know the regulations, subject matter experts (SMEs), we've been stalled for over a year. In the meantime, we've done work that we hope can speed up future progress.
Code for Boston can help in the creation of code for benefit programs, forms for users to enter their data, and systems to make maintenance easier.
The Cliff Effects project was originally intended to help case managers help their clients better understand how their changes in circumstance could affect changes in their benefits. For example, how a change in earnings could affect their net income. We worked broadly with the Center for Social Policy at UMass Boston. We worked specifically with the case managers at Project Hope to discover possible solutions and to test out the prototype as we developed it.
Lacking resources, specifically subject matter experts (SMEs), the project's progress stopped part-way through creating its functioning demo. Currently the project has implemented, as much as possible, what the project partners requested:
- Calculations (non-validated) for two public assistance programs:
- Section 8 Housing Voucher
- SNAP
- A form for case managers to fill in with their clients.
- Output of calculation results made based on client data.
Our partners also told us to only account for some of the regulations. For example, their case managers don't work with a lot of students, so we were told not to account for income limits created for students.
The output we've created includes both a text summary for the client to print and graphs that show how the net income of someone with the client's data can change as their earnings change, going from $0/year to $100,000/year.
You can see the demo at https://codeforboston.github.io/cliff-effects/.
You can see and try the volunteer-developed code at https://github.com/codeforboston/cliff-effects.