PROVIDENCE — With Rhode Island’s economy in a tailspin and unemployment at its highest level in three years, it might seem inevitable that the state’s welfare rolls have skyrocketed.

And yet they have plunged by double digits.

Since late 2007, the number of people in this state receiving cash assistance has dropped by more than 16 percent.

Experts attribute the decline to several factors including tighter eligibility, a potential lag time between when the economy falters and when people seek state benefits, and the fact that some newcomers might not know how to find help.

While not unexpected, the drop has raised concerns that some of Rhode Island’s struggling families aren’t receiving the assistance they need.

“Absolutely there are people who need help and aren’t getting it,” said Karen Malcolm, Executive Director of Ocean State Action, an advocacy group for low-income Rhode Islanders.

“A lot of families who are becoming newly eligible may not have ever had to access this state system before and have no idea about the programs and services that are out there,” Malcolm continued.

“Imagine, you’re sitting at home, you’ve been laid off, you’re out of unemployment and you think ‘oh my god, I’m completely on my own.’ Even if you know there must be some help, you’re going to spend days or weeks trying to figure out the system.”

A Carcieri administration spokeswoman defended the state’s efforts to promote its safety net programs, including the Family Independence Program, commonly known as welfare. The Department of Human Services, she said, has worked hard to get the word out.

The seeds of Rhode Island’s modern welfare program, like those around the country, began in 1996 when the Clinton administration overhauled the nation’s system, replacing a decades-old entitlement program with work requirements and time limits for enrolled families.

In the years that followed, welfare rolls around the country dropped precipitously. But in some states, Rhode Island, among them, elected officials created a variety of exemptions that resulted in slower declines.

Here in the Ocean State, for example, children were exempt from a cap restricting the amount of time they could receive cash assistance, essentially assuring that their families received some money until they were 18. That could explain in part why in 2007, Rhode Island had the third-highest number of recipients on welfare as a percentage of population in the nation, according to a report in Congressional Quarterly’s State Fact Finder.

That rule changed last year when Rhode Island lawmakers, desperate for savings, voted to limit children to a total of five years of assistance.

The new legislation took effect this past October, cutting upwards of 2,400 children from the rolls that month alone.

At the time, more than half of the enrolled families had been receiving FIP money for more than five years, according to data from the Department of Human Services. One quarter had been on the rolls for more than a decade.

A second part of that legislation, further restricting the time that families can receive cash assistance, will take effect in July. When it does, advocates say it will drive down the numbers yet again.

All those changes may have created a sense of chaos for applicants old and new.

“There’s a lot of confusion by families about how to apply and who is eligible,” said Elizabeth Burke Bryant, executive director of Rhode Island Kids Count.

Carcieri Spokeswoman Amy Kempe reiterated that the state has done what it can to make information available.

“The 211 line lets you talk to someone live and confidentially,” Kempe said, “People who don’t know how to sign up or are nervous or embarrassed can ask questions and get information they need.”

But Malcolm of Ocean State Action said one need only look at the increase in food stamp participation to see that the state isn’t doing enough. While welfare numbers have dropped, food stamp enrollment has grown in the last year, likely as the result of outreach efforts by local non-profits and the University of Rhode Island’s Feinstein Center for a Hunger Free America.

Donalda Carlson, administrator of child and family support services at the Department of Human Services, predicts the welfare rolls will not stay low for much longer.

For most families there tends to be a lag time between when a parent suffers a job loss or other economic hardship and when it becomes necessary to apply for cash benefits, she said.

Many of Rhode Island’s also jobless collect unemployment checks that are too large to allow them to concurrently qualify for cash assistance (usually those who receive more than $554 a month), or they may have a small savings or help from family which stretches for a short time.

“I also think there are people that are not going to apply for benefits as their first line of defense,” said Carlson.

But the longer the economy falters, the more families will run out of first line options, potentially turning to the welfare program in the spring and summer.

“I would say it’s very likely we’ll see an uptick in the number of [welfare] cases locally” in the next six months to a year, Carlson estimates. Already, she noted, the numbers have crept up slightly since October, topping 20,000 statewide.

Linda Katz, Policy Director of Rhode Island College’s Poverty Institute, said it is difficult to estimate how long a lag time could last.

If applications do increase, Providence Rep. Thomas C. Slater believes the state face trouble.

“We’ve seen what happened at the [Department of Labor and Training],” he said, referring to the backlog in unemployment applications that has come as a result of soaring jobless rates. “I think we could have a real staffing problem here too. If we don’t have enough employees we’ve got to get more people into the department to handle.”

Right now, Carlson said, the average application takes about 20 days to process, well within the 30-day window allowed by state law. The Department of Human Services will monitor the situation weekly, she said.

If additional staff is needed in the coming months, it will be requested. Stimulus update

•The Senate is expected to vote on a $827-billion version of an economic stimulus today or tomorrow. The measure will then have to be reconciled with a $819-billion package approved by the House. Most Republicans remain strongly opposed to either version of the bill, saying they represent grossly excessive spending and do not get at the root causes of the economic crisis. Democratic leaders hope to have a final version ready for President Obama to sign by Feb. 16.

•Questions on the state of the economy are likely to dominate Mr. Obama’s first formal news conference, scheduled to be televised at 8 tonight. The president is also scheduled to travel to Indiana and Florida this week to rally public support for the plan.

•The administration decides to wait until tomorrow to reveal how it plans to spend the $350 billion approved by Congress to shore up the nation’s banks.

cneedham@projo.com