One Milestone Accomplished
Day 17
Yesterday provided the first notice from the Social Security Administration. We received notice that they were processing the applications for the youngest two children. Isn’t that great? Those that need it least are being processed!
Well, with that prelude, we are nearly shocked into unconsciousness today. The social security card, yeah the actual card, arrived today for the male most eligible for employment! We never received notice that it was being processed, and yet here it is.
There are seven cards to go, but because we have one, the world has just opened up. Employment, assistance, even acquiring telephone service just got easier. It’s a great feeling to reach this important milestone in every resettlement.
Another event that took place today was the meeting with the family and their case worker to discuss the matching grant program. Even though we’ve been through this before, every detail was explained again. I’m sure this is more for the family’s benefit than ours.
One side effect of the matching grant program with a family of eight (well, two families of 4) is that they will receive a suitable starting level of monthly income. Of course the hard part is that we’ve got to have sufficient in-kind contributions of time, mileage, funding to meet our obligation in the process. Typically this has not been a problem for us as time is valued nicely. Furthermore we’ll be paying rent, most likely in full, or nearly so, for the second and third months and then contributing at lower levels for several more months.
There is still activity at the house preparing it for move-in day. Did I mention earlier that there was a wood-burning stove in the place? We had that, and the brick platform it was on, removed for safety and liability reasons. We are grateful to the volunteers that gave their time to take on this project which even includes patching the roof.
Excitement is building for the imminent move-in. Even our team member who attended the matching grant meeting said that the family was rather smiley and excited about the upcoming move. Phew!
