I totally understand this, because that is the best possible check, is if the individual receives a letter, a phone call, some notification, and says, wait a minute and raises a hand immediately that there is a problem here.

Did the U.S. Government agree to provide some kind of minimum float here?

I have to say that the answers that I have heard so far have not fully reassured me that that is going to make the process accessible for those three percent that you were talking about.

I very much appreciate and understand the importance of trying to move as many people as possible to the electronic system.

Well, Mr. Secretary, I am glad to hear that we are not thinking about giving them another $30 million, but I am still having trouble understanding the contract itself.

I am hearing Ms. Vallas describe as 'I had to fight to get someone to send me by mail a copy of the waiver.'

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, Ranking Member Burr, for holding this meeting today.

for every dollar spent on the Meals on Wheels program, we save $50 in Medicare costs.

What you are telling me is you might not catch the last two percent.

So, we are talking here about fraud, and I just want to go back and unpack this a little bit.

If instead of spending $800 million on the congregate meals programs, we doubled that to $1.6 million, can you just speak very briefly to the question of both how many people would be helped and how much money we would save doing that?

this is not a subsidy. This is money people earned, and it's just trying to help them get the money they earned.

this is also a profound moral question, a question about helping people retain their independence.

Social Security provides a safety net to keep people out of poverty, but it's a very modest safety net.

I am glad to hear that we do not have plans to do that in the future.

So you have done some retraining so people now on the phone will explain that a waiver is available?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you very much for holding this hearing today.

Someone has to advocate on behalf of the two percent who may be different in some substantial respects from the other 98 percent.