Brooklyn A’s Victor Torres Explains SSD, SSI on WBAI’s “You and Your Money”

Victor Torres, Disability Unit Director at Brooklyn Legal Services Corporation A (a program of Legal Services NYC), was the featured guest on July 17th's "You and Your Money" program on WBAI. Victor spoke to host Susan Lee about the differences between Social Security Disability and Supplemental Security Income and how each can be a lifeline for people in need.

Listen to the interview in full by visiting WBAI's archive page and clicking on "You and Your Money- Friday, July 17th, 2009 10:30am" (you must have Adobe Flash player installed). You can also download the program directly by clicking here.

Legal Services NYC's Disability Advocacy Project (DAP) helps low income
disabled children and adults get Social Security disability benefits
and move off of welfare. Currently, thousands of adults and children
remain on City welfare rolls when they should receive federal
disability benefits instead. Most of these individuals receive no help
in applying for federal disability assistance. Moving adults and
children from public assistance to disability assistance helps
individuals, their families, and the City.

Adults and children who qualify for Social Security (SSI) receive more
than $600 per month from the federal government and the state,
substantially more than they would receive from public assistance. And
when welfare recipients qualify for federal disability benefits, the
City gets money back in “interim assistance” payments and saves money
in the future. A recent article form the NYC Independent Budget Office
notes that by moving people from public assistance to SSI, the City has
saved “hundreds of millions of dollars in potential cash assistance
costs each year. . . [E]very time a person receives SSI rather than
public assistance the city saves money.”

Our program has improved the ability of low-income New Yorkers to
receive Social Secutiry by representing scores of adults and children
who have been denied Social Securtity benefits and saving the City
millions of dollars. In 2004, for example, a State allocation to Legal
Services NYC and Legal Aid of $2.5 million for disability advocacy work
yielded a return to the City of over $6.5 million in averted public
assistance and Medicaid costs.