The Administration for Children and Families' Office of Family Assistance (OFA) Regions V, VI, VII, and VIII hosted a webinar, "TANF Children Endangered by Drug Use" on Tuesday, August 12, 2014 from 2:00 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. EDT. This webinar was the first in the 2014 Regions V, VI, VII, and VIII Tribal TANF webinar series: "Addressing the Needs of Children." It addressed the growing issue of protecting children in environments of increasing drug use. Key topics included: identifying when a child is exposed to drug use in his/her home; implementing processes for addressing the needs of drug endangered children; and strategies for keeping a child's life stable when his/her family is unstable.

The Administration for Children and Families, Office of Family Assistance, Regions V and VII convened a meeting in Chicago, Illinois entitled “Building Bridges to Self-Sufficiency: Tools for ACF Region V and VII TANF Programs” from September 4 - 5, 2014. This one and one-half day in-person technical assistance meeting was aimed at State TANF managers and State leadership. Participants were provided technical assistance and training that would contribute to and facilitate improvements in their States’ ability to meet TANF program goals and Federal requirements. The Region’s focus was provided through facilitated collaboration, communication, and problem-solving sessions. Region V and VII managers shared lessons learned and gathered strategies that can improve their own programs’ ability to identify and address multiple barriers, including assisting the homeless community, understanding the foundations of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA), and how executive functioning and soft skills can led to economic success. Participants were provided an opportunity to interact with presenters, while receiving new information on programmatic changes and updates, and practical approaches to take to their home States dealing with TANF Programs.

In December 2011, representatives from the Jefferson County Department of Human Services, Career and Family Support Services, Colorado Works and Child Care Assistance Program contacted the Welfare Peer TA (WPTA) Network for assistance in determining the optimal number of cases each TANF caseworker should maintain, so that an appropriate amount of time and attention can be paid to all participants to assist them in achieving higher levels of economic self-sufficiency. In response to Jefferson County’s TA Request, the WPTA team conducted information gathering outreach to 10 of the largest cities in the country (New York, New York; Los Angeles, California; Chicago, Illinois; Houston, Texas; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Phoenix, Arizona; San Antonio, Texas; San Diego, California; Dallas, Texas; and San Jose, California). This data provided Colorado and other States a greater understanding of optimal caseload sizes for TANF offices, and of caseload sizes per TANF eligibility workers versus case managers. The Technical Assistance Summary associated with this effort provides a high-level overview of TANF caseload sizes among the 10 highlighted metropolitan areas. It also provides insight into staffing structure, caseload size designation, characteristics of staff and participants, caseload manageability, caseload assignments, caseload demographic information, workload and responsibilities of staff, curricula and training, as well as barriers and challenges faced by the TANF programs.

In response to a technical assistance request from the Minnesota Department of Human Services pertaining to gaining a more clear understanding of the different state supervised/county administered models, the Peer Technical Assistance Network organized a peer-to-peer roundtable in Chicago, Illinois on July 18-19, 2012 with directors and staff from state supervised/county administered Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) programs. This report describes the technical assistance request and response, as well as the overall findings from the roundtable event and lays out potential recommendations for future discussions about the state supervised/county administered structure.

On September 10-11, 2013, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Office of Family Assistance hosted the Regions V & VII TANF Priority Update Meeting in Kansas City, Missouri. Representatives from Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, and Wisconsin met to network and share lessons learned and promising practices and to seek guidance from Federal and Regional staff in a number of different areas, including: planning to implement TANF EBT requirements, understanding the implications of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, addressing homelessness through TANF, utilizing data to inform program practices, developing career pathways for TANF participants, and discussing key TANF issues with Federal ACF leadership.

This first webinar in the 2013 Region VI and VIII TANF Data Reporting and Analysis Webinar Series was held on Thursday, June 27, 2013. The webinar, sponsored by the Administration for Children and Families (ACF), Regions VI and VIII, was open to all Region VI and VIII State TANF Directors and staff, local TANF agencies, and contractors. The webinar featured Patrick Brannen, a Statistical Consultant to ACF's Office of Family Assistance. He was responsible for statistical aspects of data collection and reporting of the TANF Data Report and the Separate State Programs – Maintenance of Effort (SSP-MOE) Data Report and for data analysis, including the calculation of the Work Participation Rates. Patrick Brannen provided a brief overview of the Section 1-4 reports, Work Participation Rate files and feedback, TANF sampling, and common edits and error flags.

The Urban Institute recently published an article discussing the Work Support Strategies Initiative. Work Support Strategies (WSS) is a multiyear, multi-State initiative to implement reforms that help eligible low-income families get and keep a full package of work support benefits, including Medicaid, nutrition assistance (SNAP), and child care assistance. This report summarizes the lessons learned from the nine planning grant States (Colorado, Idaho, Illinois, Kentucky, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina), just one year into a four-year project. The report includes what the States did, how they overcame challenges, and how the planning year changed their strategies and capacities for the future.

On September 11-12, 2012, the Office of Family Assistance (OFA) Regions V and VII convened State TANF program directors and other key stakeholders in Chicago, Illinois to strategically engage with peers on effectively providing services to families in a recovering economy and to brainstorm better ways to help TANF participants achieve self-sufficiency. The TANF Priority Update Meeting consisted of multiple sessions covering an array of topics, including: business process management; strategies to improve postsecondary career pathways for low-income workers; developing and sustaining employment entry, access, retention, and advancement for TANF participants and low-income clients; improving services and tracking outcomes for special populations; innovative strategies for client assessment and service coordination; and effective strategies for engaging workforce partners through summer youth employment and subsidized employment.

In 2002, the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) instituted the Community Healthy Marriage Initiative (CHMI) evaluation to document operational lessons and assess the effectiveness of community-based approaches to support healthy relationships, marriages, and child well-being. The evaluation is being conducted by RTI International and The Urban Institute. A component of the CHMI study involved an implementation study on initiatives approved by the Office of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE) under authority of Section 1115 of the Social Security Act.1 The goals of the initiatives were to improve the child support systems through community engagement and healthy marriage and relationship education programs. Operationally, these goals included direct improvements to the child support program, like increasing the number of child support orders established, increasing paternity establishment, and increasing payment toward support obligations. The broader context for these operational goals was improving child well-being and increasing parental responsibility.

This is the final in a series of reports being produced on the implementation of demonstrations in 14 sites receiving grants under the 1115 waivers. Earlier reports covered the implementation of initiatives in Atlanta, Georgia; Boston, Massachusetts; Chicago, Illinois; Denver, Colorado; Grand Rapids, Michigan; Jacksonville, Florida; Lexington, Kentucky; Minneapolis, Minnesota; Nampa, Idaho; and New Orleans, Louisiana. This report focuses on the initiatives in Marion County, Indiana; Clark County, Ohio; Lakewood, Washington; and Yakima, Washington. The goal of the implementation studies was to describe the nature of the community initiatives, including recruitment and outreach strategies, targeting efforts, and innovative approaches for linking child support with healthy relationship and marriage support activities. This report examines key aspects of the initiatives’ community partnerships, design and implementation of service delivery, and links with child support. It does not present estimates of program impacts or effectiveness. The report is based on site visits conducted in 2010, 3 to 5 years after the initiatives were initially approved as well as information provided over the course of operations by grantees. Because these visits took place when the initiatives were ongoing, this report is not a complete accounting of what the initiatives accomplished or how many people they served over the course of their waivers. (author abstract)

Colorado, Idaho, Illinois, North Carolina, Rhode Island, and South Carolina have been awarded three year grants to implement user-friendly and quick-to-deliver public benefit systems. The grants, as part of the "Work Support Strategies: Streamlining Access, Strengthening Families (WSS)" initiative, are largely funded through the Ford Foundation, with additional funding from the Open Society Foundations and the Annie E. Casey Foundation.