ACF Region I held a TANF Emergency Funds: Strategies for Maximizing Federal and State Resources for Families Meeting on January 14, 2010. There were representatives from each of the ACF Region I States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. Representatives from the central and regional offices of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) ACF Office of Family Assistance (OFA), the Office of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE), the Child Care Bureau (CCB), and the regional offices of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Department of Labor (DOL) Employment and Training Administration (ETA), were in attendance. This meeting explored how States could utilize the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 which included the TANF Emergency Contingency Funds, and appropriated $5 billion for the provision of the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program for creating/enhancing subsidized employment programs, providing basic assistance (cash grants to low-income families), and providing non-recurrent short-term payments (e.g. four months of rental assistance for homeless families, security deposit and first month’s rent, utility assistance). In order to assist States in developing and implementing innovative initiatives to respond to rising caseloads and/or rising expenditures, ACF Region I held this meeting for States to discuss and share subsidized employment programs, on-the-job training, and non-recurrent short term benefits programs and to work together to determine next steps.

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.

This report details the September 2002 Conference on ACF's Positive Youth Development initiative and provides information on how to effectively incorporate the initiative into a cross section of ACF supported programs such as TANF, Child Support, Head Start, Child Care, Child Welfare, Independent Living, and Runaway and Homeless Youth.

The following report describes the Urban Partnerships for Welfare Reform Academy III that took place in St. Louis, Missouri from March 8-11, 2005 to foster collaboration to improve administration and delivery of services to TANF families.

The Urban Partnerships Initiative was designed by the Administration for Children and Families to support the work of TANF stakeholders in urban environments by promoting shared learning, enhancing cities' performance management, and developing strategies to improve services to families so that they may achieve and maintain self-sufficiency. The following report describes the Urban Partnerships for Welfare Reform Leadership Forum that took place in Baltimore, Maryland.

This report summarizes a national conference that took place in Arlington, VA, on March 20-21, 2003. The conference was jointly sponsored by the Department of Health and Human Services Administration for Children and Families (ACF) and Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). This conference brought together substance abuse treatment agency directors and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) administrators from forty States, the District of Columbia, and the Virgin Islands. The conference provided a forum for these policymakers and administrators to share information about their experience and concerns, and their promising strategies used in strengthening the collaboration and partnership of TANF and substance abuse treatment directors.

The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) of 1996 replaced the Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), the Job Opportunities and Basic Skills (JOBS) and Emergency Assistance programs wit the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program. Under TANF, the nature of public assistance changed from an entitlement program to one that requires individuals to work in order to receive time-limited support. This change in the welfare delivery system was accompanied by an increase in State-level flexibility in program design and operation. Welfare reform required no less than a redefinition of the role of decision makers at the Federal, State and local level, including the role played by front line workers when interacting with welfare recipients. In the journey toward reinventing the social safety net, States have met a variety of formidable challenges. Five years after the passage of welfare reform, this report takes stock of the past and current challenges that States have encountered. This report focuses on the policies and services provided to the hardest-to-serve and on the network of collaborations that States have developed to address the needs of these populations.

The Welfare Peer Technical Assistance Network, funded by the Administration for Children and Families (ACF), Office of Family Assistance (OFA), Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) coordinated this workshop in conjunction with the Office of Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE), DHHS. Ms. Julia Isaacs, Director, Data and Technical Analysis Division, ASPE/HSP, led the planning and conduct of this workshop. It was intended for states or counties that were awarded specific ASPE grants in 1998 to study welfare “leavers.”

The Welfare Peer Technical Assistance Network, funded by the Administration for Children and Families, Office of Family Assistance, coordinated two-day site visits at the request of several Regional and State Department of Health and Human Services Offices. States were invited to participate based on findings resulting from the Network’s national needs assessment regarding the challenges and successes of implementation of State welfare reform initiatives. Ms. Vesta Kimble, Deputy Director of the Anne Arundel County Department of Social Services, led the site visit. Ms. Kimble provided an in-depth description of Anne Arundel County’s Family Investment Program. This technical assistance event afforded participants an opportunity to observe Anne Arundel’s welfare service delivery system first hand.

One of the most prominent roadblocks that Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) clients face to a successful transition to employment is substance abuse. In order to address these issues that TANF families affected by substance abuse face the Welfare Peer Technical Assistance Network held a conference entitled Effectively Serving Clients with Substance Abuse Problems: Making a Difference on the Frontline in Newark, New Jersey on February 19th and 20th. The purpose of this 2-day seminar was two fold: to provide participants with an opportunity to understand how TANF agencies and treatment providers can work together to better serve clients and to showcase New Jersey’s referral process for families struggling with substance abuse in order to meet work requirements and remain self-sufficient. The report provides a summary of this workshop.