The term Interim Assistance Agreements may be foreign to some, but Minnesotans who have no source of income, due to disabilities and an inability to work, probably know the term well if they reached out to the state of Minnesota for cash assistance and other resources.
The sate provides many different types of assistance. There is the Minnesota Family Investment Program (MFIP). This program provides cash assistance to families with children to meet basic needs. There is a requirement that parents work, but even if they do, many times they are unable to meet the basic needs of their family, and this is where MFIP helps. The Diversionary Work Program (DWP) is a program that was established to try and prevent families from needing access to MFIP. It is a four-month program that helps Minnesota parents find jobs. Then there is the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which provides food to low-income individuals and families. All of these programs have no requirement of contracts, guarantees or repayment of benefits, but General Assistance (GA) is a different story. This program provides cash assistance to individuals without children, who are unable to work enough to support themselves due to impairments. If qualified, individuals are required to apply for Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) and Supplemental Security Income (SSI). Basically GA is a loan until the recipient receives Social Security benefits. Once that occurs, the individual is required to reimburse the amounts of GA they received. This reimbursement comes in the form of Interim Assistance Agreements.
Each person who receives GA is required to sign an Interim Assistance Agreement, which provides reimbursement to the state if the individual receives Social Security disability benefits. More information about Interim Assistance Agreements can be found here. If a person who receives GA applies for Social Security disability, and ultimately gets denied, they are not required to payback the GA they have received.
