The Urban Partnerships Initiative cities of Cleveland, Oakland, and Portland presented during this session of the National Academy, which was held in Atlanta, Georgia. Partner cities explained how they have improved technology to better serve children and families on the TANF caseload in their localities.

This presentation was given as part of the Urban Partnerships for Welfare Reform's National Academy, which was held in Atlanta, Georgia in May 2006. Hennepin County, Minnesota (Minneapolis) shared strategies on utilizing diversion and emergency assistance programs.

On July 9–11, 2007, in Memphis, Tennessee, the Urban Partnerships Initiative brought together employers and key leadership from 26 cities with the goal of continuing the exchange of innovative strategies and solutions for moving people from welfare to work, and identifying ways to enhance collaboration among TANF stakeholders, employers, and other community resources. During the event, the partners participated in panels, roundtable sessions, and other in-depth discussions about strategies for achieving universal engagement, improving work attachment, promoting job retention, and increasing wage advancement. For the city representatives, improving job placement services for their low-income residents is a critical, although extremely challenging, endeavor.

This report was authored through the Carsey Institute at the University of New Hampshire. The researcher outlines the changing nature of women and work nationally over time, and in rural and urban areas. The focus of this research is five key changes: 1) the increase in women’s employment, 2) the recent “opting out” phenomenon, 3) the rise in women’s earnings and declines in the earnings gap, 4) the rise in the working poor, and 5) the decline in the traditional family structure of a husband as breadwinner with a stay-at-home wife. As an example, many rural families are relying more on the woman’s income to supplement the family’s earnings and are working in traditionally male dominated fields like farming and mining.

The Collaboration Institute was held in Arlington, Virginia on September 15-17, 2008. The meeting was designed for teams from medium-sized urban areas composed of three partners representing senior level managers from TANF, Child Support Enforcement, and Workforce Development agencies. The Institute provided a hands-on intensive opportunity for strategic planning and culminated in the development of an action plan to be implemented upon return to participants’ jurisdictions. The areas of focus during the Institute were on: ways to increase collaboration between State and local TANF, Workforce Development, and Child Support Enforcement agencies; examining the close link between welfare, workforce development, and child support; understanding how collaborative efforts are addressing State work participation rates; and providing a platform for key issues in child support and workforce development that impact TANF participants.

This report was funded through the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation and provides data from a survey of 1,200 faith-based and secular nonprofit social service agencies. The results show FBOs that integrate religious elements into service delivery and secular nonprofit organizations are more accessible to poor populations than FBOs that do not integrate religious elements into service provision. FBOS are currently providing the safety net to support TANF leavers on a path to self-sufficiency.

This publication is from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Family Assistance under contract with ICF International. Through the Urban Partnerships Initiative, this resource shows the outstanding efforts of ten cities to meet the needs of families receiving Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). The innovative practices highlighted in this piece can be applied in other urban areas throughout the Nation to enable other cities to write their own success story during the next decade of welfare reform.

From the Urban Institute, this paper is an evaluation of the Special Homeless Initiative (HI) of the Massachusetts Department of Mental Health. The Homeless Initiative was designed to prevent and end homelessness among the most vulnerable clients and clients with serious mental illness. This is the third report in the evaluation series and provides data on client outcomes from the Initiative.

This is a speech given by Alan Berube of the Brookings Institution to Congressional staff on the benefits of the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) to urban economies. In this resource, Mr. Berube defines ways that members can maximize the EITC benefit to support low-income families. As well as providing significant benefits to families in cities and suburbs, the EITC has been proven to stimulate local economic activity.

From the Chapin Hall Center for Children, this report outlines child population trends and implications of these trends on services for families in Chicago. Authors identify Chicago neighborhoods with more children living in poverty and offer information on schools and programs that serve children in the city. Researchers provide data from the 1990s and also project population trends and service delivery up to the year 2010 for Chicago’s children.