ON THE FRONT LINES OF WELFARE DELIVERY - ARE WORKERS IMPLEMENTING POLICY REFORMS

The impact of policy changes on the local delivery of services has bee n overlooked in several decades of largely unsuccessful efforts to ''r eform'' welfare. This article uses one case of state-level welfare ref orm in the early 1990s to examine the implementation of policy changes in local welfare offices. Direct observation of transactions between welfare workers and clients suggest that policy reforms were not fully implemented by street-level bureaucrats. The instrumental transaction s that continued to dominate interactions with clients were consistent with processing claims and rationing scarce resources, but they were poorly aligned with new policies aimed at changing the services and me ssage delivered to welfare clients. The failure to fully implement ref orms on the frontlines has implications for the achievement of policy objectives and for equity in service provision. Implementation issues will have even greater urgency as welfare is devolved from federal to state governments.