This blogpost reviews the operations and procedures of the Safe & Sound Family Resource Center in San Francisco. The blogpost notes the intake interview process where families identify what they perceive as their needs and helps to illustrate how the families are functioning, including their support network, what types of concrete supports they need, and what they see as their strengths. The blogpost also highlights “light touch” services offered to help enhance protection for parents and children, such as parenting and education classes, parenting support groups, counseling, and respite childcare. There is also discussion of the Integrated Family Services program, which offers a more intensive level of services to families living in conditions that create the highest risk for child abuse and neglect; many of these families have three or more adverse childhood experiences.

This blogpost illustrates the implementation of the A Better Life (ABL) program in Massachusetts–an economic mobility model for public housing residents that incorporates comprehensive case management, community partnerships with local service providers, an escrow savings account, and work requirements. The blogpost identifies how the COVID-19 pandemic has changed the nature of the coaching provided by the ABL program to help address ABL participants’ basic and mental health needs and how the pandemic has created opportunity for stronger relationships and trust between participants and coaches as these needs are met. Also discussed are shifts in the goal setting process among participants toward meeting immediate needs and how COVID-19 responses have pushed ABL to a “whole family” approach over centering on individual participants.

This report assesses how place-based employment programs can help families navigate support systems, address needs during the pandemic, and help participants reengage with work when the labor market reopens. The report highlights Jobs Plus, an employment program that has been implemented in 35 public housing developments across the country, and includes on-site employment-related services, rent-based work incentives, and a community context supporting work. The community context includes partnerships among local housing agencies, the local workforce development agencies, training providers, employers, and significant social service agencies. The report also highlights evidence of increased earnings among Jobs Plus participants and operational tips for housing agencies as they help families.

This fact sheet briefly outlines the top needs for kin families and potential funding sources to meet these needs. The funding sources include: Social Security Act Title IV-B kinship navigator grants, Family First Transition Act, the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, and new (and temporary) Federal Medical Assistance Percentage dollars. The fact sheet also offers some pointers on how to develop partnerships that recognize and enhance kinship care programs.

This research to practice brief from the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation describes examination of findings from nine rural programs that serve child welfare-involved parents with substance use disorders. The examination was unable to provide information on program effectiveness but does focus on the range of services offered, the targeted population, how funding is blended, and collaborative approaches of these programs. Programs covered in this brief are: Children and Recovering Mothers (CHARM) Care Collaborative (Burlington, Vermont); Iowa Department of Human Services Parent Partner Mentoring Program; Kentucky Sobriety Treatment and Recovery Teams (START); Vermont Hub and Spoke Model; Women in Recovery (Tulsa, Oklahoma); The Arizona Families in Recovery Succeeding Together (FIRST) Program; Helen Ross McNabb Center (HRMC) Great Starts Program and Motivating our Mothers to Succeed Silver Linings and Rise to Recovery Models (Knoxville, Tennessee); and Parent-Child Assistance Program (Washington State).

This issue brief from the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation defines “social capital” in the context of human services programs. To illustrate how social capital can be strengthened for incarcerated or reentering persons, the brief identifies lessons learned from three programs: RecycleForce, Hudson Link for Higher Education in Prison, and Prison Fellowship Academy at the Nebraska Correctional Center for Women. The brief also highlights six considerations for implementing models to build social capital among this population.

This Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin at Madison webinar examined what can be known in real time about recent changes in poverty. Specific questions covered in the webinar included:

• How did the nature of the pre-Covid economy create risks for poverty? How do these risks vary across demographic groups and geographies?
• What likely has happened to poverty rates and what will happen over the next several months as a result of the Covid-19 economic fall-out?
• To what extent have initial federal policy responses buffered any effects on poverty? (And what factors may be limiting their anti-poverty potential?)
• What factors and data should researchers, advocates, and policymakers be tracking now and in the coming months?      

Speakers included researchers from the University of Washington, Urban Institute, Columbia University, American University, and the Minnesota Department of Human Services.

This blogpost from the Commissioner of the Administration on Children, Youth and Families profiles the Handle with Care (HWC) program, which is an intervention focused on trauma-informed responses among law enforcement, schools, and mental health providers to address exposure to adverse childhood experiences. The HWC program initially began in 2013 in Charleston, West Virginia and aims to ensure that children exposed to crime, violence, or abuse can receive interventions to support their ability to succeed in school. The HWC model relies upon law enforcement to share a “handle with care” notice with an affected child’s school if law enforcement has been at the affected child’s household the night before to address an incidence of violence or crime at home.

This podcast series of three episodes discusses how networks and relationship building constitute social capital. The episodes, entitled “Close-Knit Communities for Better Outcomes: Using Peer Groups,” “Friend Request Accepted: Using Technology and Social Capital,” and “Beyond Icebreakers: How to Help Participants Really Connect,” include discussions with health and human service experts who offer ways to help program participants create and access social capital and improve their outcomes. The podcast is hosted by Anita Brown Graham of the ncIMPACT initiative at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention within the U.S. Department of Justice will host a webinar on July 30, 2020 from 2:00 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. ET which will focus on serving adolescents in family drug courts. Emphasis will be on encouraging youth to engage in building positive relationships with adults and peers and to be actively involved in developing their own voice as they transition into adulthood. Strategies for substance use prevention and treatment and information on recovery support will also be addressed.