There is always a danger with taxpayer-funded welfare programs that recipients of government benefits may begin to see them as a normal way of life and lose motivation to seek work and support themselves.
So it made sense for the Chattanooga Housing Authority to encourage employment by giving housing priority to people who had jobs.
But it was deeply discouraging to learn recently that at least some people have been cynically manipulating that policy.
CHA officials don’t have specific numbers, but they say that some people have gotten a job, used their working status to get into public housing ahead of others and then promptly quit their jobs.
“[W]hat we found was a lot of people would take advantage of jumping over people on the waiting list when there wasn’t real intent to continue working,” CHA Executive Director Betsy McCright told the Times Free Press.