Yesterday the NYT reported that as part of their welfare-to-work efforts, New York City agencies have been recruiting former beneficiaries for jobs as telephone psychics.

Overcoming years of dependency on open-ended entitlement programs is daunting, those who administer welfare-to-work efforts say.

By attending to the needs of parents and children, All Our Kin makes a connection missed by most welfare-to-work efforts, experts said.

But city officials say there is another sizable group of families who do not seem to have any reason that their caseworkers deem serious enough to keep them from participating in the welfare-to-work effort.

And other companies the city is already working with on the welfare-to-work effort are angry over what they say is a poorly organized program to shift welfare recipients into jobs.

In 2000, the city's welfare-to-work effort required her to return to work.

Then in 2000, the city's welfare-to-work effort required that Ms. Henderson take a job.

In rejecting the contracts, Mr. Hevesi said he supported the city's welfare-to-work efforts but criticized how the city went about choosing the companies.

Patricia A. Wilson-Coker, commissioner of the Connecticut Department of Social Services, said the study only reinforced her belief in the state's welfare-to-work efforts.

It is the first time the city has agreed to pay a commercial business to help in its welfare-to-work efforts.