In 2011, fourteen tribes and tribal organizations received grants from the Office of Family Assistance (OFA) for Coordination of Tribal TANF and Child Welfare Services to Tribal Families. These grants were designed to provide innovative and relevant approaches to coordinating services between TANF and child welfare systems. This report from the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation summarizes the grantees’ experiences with direct services and interagency coordination thus far. One key finding was that most grantees reported challenges in staffing, engaging project partners, and retaining the highest-risk families. However, all of the grantees reported progress toward their goals.

U.S. families living in poverty who survive without either income from a job or from government-sponsored cash assistance are sometimes referred to as “disconnected.” This research brief from Child Trends uses data from the 2011-2012 National Survey of Children’s Health to quantify the population of children living in disconnected families in each state and to describe the extent to which families access other forms of public assistance. Some findings include: 30 percent of all children lived in disconnected families in 2011-2012; the majority of children in disconnected families lived in a household where someone received some form of public assistance, such as Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program; and the amount of children in disconnected families varied widely by State.

This Information Memorandum (IM) encourages TANF and child welfare agencies to coordinate and share data on the children, youth, and families they both serve. It reminds TANF programs that they are permitted under federal law to determine their own confidentiality rules and recommends cross-training and information sharing across TANF and child welfare to maximize resources and services, and help families meet the requirements of both programs.

The Child Welfare Information Gateway released a brief that provides an overview of the crossover between the child welfare and human trafficking fields. There is a particular focus on sex trafficking of children and youth, since that type of trafficking is more likely to affect the child welfare population. This resource includes background information, highlights of Federal legislation, and recommendations for child welfare agencies to address this issue.

Previous research has shown that receiving child support not only reduces the chance of families returning to welfare, but that it also reduces child poverty and, on average, accounts for 40% of a low-income family’s income. This study examines the relationship between child support receipt in Maryland and returns to the TANF program. Results show that women who do not receive child support after leaving the program are far more likely to return to welfare; that larger and more consistent child support payments reduce the chances of a family returning to welfare; and that receiving any child support reduces recidivism, though this is less likely for women with lower incomes.

Youth transitioning out of foster care and into adulthood need various supports to navigate the challenges they face. Recently, federal child welfare policy has significantly increased the availability of these supports. In 1999, the Foster Care Independence Act amended Title IV-E of the Social Security Act to create the Chafee Foster Care Independence Program. This amendment increased funds available to states for independent living services including training in daily living skills, education and employment assistance, counseling, and case management. Although these funds can be spent on a wide range of services and supports, much of the funding is being spent on services aimed at promoting educational attainment, which has become increasingly essential to economic self-sufficiency and better lifelong outcomes.

This blog post kicked off National Teen Pregnancy Prevention Month. Although the pregnancy rate among U.S. teens has decreased by more than half since 1990, disparities remain. Some youth, including those in the juvenile justice and child welfare systems, are at a much higher risk of experiencing a pregnancy than are their peers. This post highlights the need to tailor teen pregnancy prevention programs to different populations. Some approaches include empowering youth and staff, creating continuity, and testing strategies to see what works.

Gwen Porter, Tribal Council Secretary, Omaha Tribe of Nebraska (Omaha) submitted a technical assistance (TA) request to the OFA Peer Technical Assistance (OFA PeerTA) Network for assistance in supporting their new Tribal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program. Because it is a new program and the majority of Tribal TANF staff has limited experience delivering this type of support, Omaha was specifically interested in developing their policies/procedures manual and receiving onsite training regarding case management and assessment practices. Omaha’s Tribal TANF program employs three caseworkers to serve a maximum of 224 TANF participants. OFA PeerTA conducted a Tribal TANF Case Management and Assessment Training in November 2014. The participants represented Tribal TANF (intake and case management staff), Child Welfare, Tribal Justice, Substance Abuse Prevention, Tribal Council, Tribal Health, and Domestic Violence Prevention departments.

 During the case management post-TA check-in call, Tribal leaders requested a strategic planning session to improve communication and coordination between these programs. The strategic planning session involving Tribal Council members and various program directors was designed to help the Tribe better identify the "big picture" on how low-income tribal members interact with public assistance programs, receive services, find and maintain employment, and become self-sufficient. The two-day strategic planning session was held in Macy, Nebraska from May 12-13, 2015.

Infants, toddlers, and children living in high-poverty communities experience a high rate of exposure to trauma, placing these youth on a compromised developmental path. This issue brief summarizes research about the impact of trauma on young children, and possible intervention strategies that could protect them from the many adverse effects of trauma. These interventions support parents in providing the stable and nurturing caregiving that is necessary for young children’s developmental growth and promoting children’s sense of safety and security. The implementation of such interventions can potentially reduce or provide a buffer against traumatic experiences for these infants and toddlers. Additionally, the brief describes how child care, Early Head Start, home visitation, and child welfare could become trauma-informed infant and toddler service delivery systems.

Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program stakeholders and their human services partners increasingly understand the importance of meaningfully engaging noncustodial parents while also holding them accountable for the economic and social growth of their children. A noncustodial parent does not have primary care, custody, or control of the child and may have an obligation to pay child support. It is important to note that many noncustodial parents pay child support and are actively engaged in their children’s lives. However, barriers such as unemployment, underemployment, or incarceration can hinder noncustodial parents from providing for their children, even when many want to do so. Some TANF agencies and their partners have built programs to provide the necessary supports and connections for these individuals to help them achieve self-sufficiency/

The OFA PeerTA Network hosted a webinar on June 9, 2015 at 1:30 PM Eastern, titled Strategies for Building and Maintaining Noncustodial Parent Programs to share strategies for building and sustaining programs to engage and serve noncustodial parents. While previous webinars have focused on strategies to engage noncustodial parents, this webinar focused on the nuts and bolts of program development; it introduced several programs that have supported noncustodial parents for at least 10 years and explored how these sustainable programs were planned and initiated.

At the end of this webinar, participants were able to:

• be aware of three models of TANF programs and their partners creating programs to serve noncustodial parents
• understand how these programs began, including justifying the need for a program serving noncustodial parents, mapping available assets, and identifying a champion; and
• be ready to identify some next steps that they could take within their agencies to start a program that would work for their communities.
Featured presenters:

Ann Marie Winter, Chief Operating Officer, and Margie McGranahan, Employment Services Director, Gulf Coast Jewish Family and Community Services. Established in 1996, Florida’s Noncustodial Parent Employment Program aims to help unemployed or underemployed noncustodial parents establish a pattern of regular child support payments by obtaining and maintaining employment. It is operated through a series of partnerships between organizations such as CareerSource Pinellas and the Gulf Coast Jewish Family and Community Services.

Juan G. Valdez, Parent Support Services Manager, Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services. The Parent Support Services program in Illinois was established in April 1994 to provide noncustodial parents with a way to address their needs and concerns to support their children. TANF dollars are used to provide specific services to qualified noncustodial parents.

Mike Roberts, Human Services Program Specialist for Districts 2, 3 and 6, Alabama Department of Child Abuse and Neglect Prevention. The Alabama Fatherhood Initiative is a joint effort of the Department of Human Resources Family Assistance and Child Support divisions, developed in 2002 to further the welfare reform goal of strengthening families, enhancing child support collections, and addressing other needs of children who are growing up without the involvement of natural fathers in their lives.