This synthesis report summarizes the work of several federal grantees charged with identifying and implementing models of effective collaboration between child welfare and TANF agencies. The demonstration project, which included five grantees, theorized that such models would result in improved outcomes for children, youth, and families who are involved with the child welfare system or are at risk of involvement. The report discusses key program interventions and activities, including joint and cross-training, data-sharing technology, data assessments, and service integration procedures.

In partnership with the Administration for Children and Families, and American Institutes for Research, the Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration, Division of Youth Services hosted a webinar on Trauma-Informed Practice for System-Involved Youth. Many disconnected youth, including youth who are runaway and homeless, or have been involved in the child welfare or juvenile justice systems, find it difficult to connect to work because of traumatic experiences. The workforce system’s ability to address trauma will lead to better employment outcomes for these youth and the businesses that hire them.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)’s Family Unification Program (FUP) provides low-income families in the child welfare system with housing vouchers. FUP is critical to understanding the overlap between the child welfare system and housing/homelessness, as well as how to provide housing to vulnerable families and facilitate partnerships between public housing agencies and child welfare agencies. This report highlights FUP implementation in eight sites and offers innovative practices and impacts.

The Office of Family Assistance held a webinar on Tuesday, January 19, 2016 from 2:00-3:30 pm EST on Service Options for Relative Caregivers in Child-Only Cases. Today almost half of the national TANF caseload consists of child-only cases, where the child is the only individual in the household receiving cash assistance. In a significant portion of these cases, a relative is caring for the child. There has been limited literature, however, on the strengths, barriers and needs of these children and their relative caregivers. There has also been limited information about the supportive services they may receive through TANF or other human services programs. In this facilitated webinar, presenters provided a descriptive and demographic overview of the relative child-only caseload, as well as the policies and practices that support them. It included examples from a kinship navigator program, as well as a TANF and child welfare system collaboration initiative.

In this webinar participants were able to:

• Understand the importance and prevalence of, as well as the strengths, barriers, and outcomes related to, relative caregivers and children in TANF child-only cases.
• Hear experiences and lessons learned from a kinship navigator program that is providing supportive services to relatives and children in child-only cases.
• Learn about collaborations between TANF and Child Welfare systems to share data and provide services to relative caregivers and children.

For users interested in the transcript of the webinar, the webinar recording is closed-captioned. 

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.