The Office of Family Assistance (OFA) has posted the fiscal year (FY) 2024 Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) financial data tables, along with national and state pie charts.

• In FY 2024, combined federal TANF and state maintenance-of-effort (MOE) expenditures and transfers totaled $37.5 billion.
• 33 states used less than half of their TANF and MOE funds on the combination of basic assistance; work, education, and training activities; and childcare.
• By the end of FY 2024, states had a total of $8 billion in federal TANF unobligated balances. With the addition of federal unliquidated obligations, the amount of unspent federal TANF funds nationwide totaled $9.7 billion.

TANF agencies can review these resources for more information on how TANF and MOE funds were used in FY 2024.

The Administration for Children and Families (ACF) has launched a new public dashboard that delivers transparent, standardized data on safety and permanency outcomes for children in foster care. The dashboard provides a centralized view of state-level child welfare performance, allowing users to explore key measures, examine trends over time, and compare data across states using information reported to ACF. 

This new tool supports ACF’s broader commitment to transparency, data quality, and performance monitoring. While the dashboard does not include TANF data or introduce new program requirements, it offers valuable context on the service landscape in which multiple ACF-administered programs operate and may inform cross-program coordination and technical assistance discussions.

The Office of Family Assistance’s TANF Outcomes Technical Assistance and Logistics (TOTAL) team delivers training and technical assistance to state TANF programs and partners responding to the Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023 (FRA). The team hosted their September office hours on September 25, 2025 to review steps to obtain administrative education data from state education agencies or state longitudinal data systems. This session included a presentation from states about their experiences and a group discussion what additional supports are needed to meet the FRA requirements.

This resource outlines the Fiscal Responsibility Act Outcomes (FRA) Working Groups. These small virtual groups will meet several times in 2026 to explore FRA reporting topics and to share ideas and challenges. Two groups are currently planned: one on administering surveys and one on collecting administrative records. Additional groups may be added based on interest.

For those interested in signing up for one or both of these working groups, please fill out the interest form at the bottom of this resource.

The Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation’s Supporting Evaluation Efforts for Demonstrations in Self-Sufficiency (SEEDS) project provided evaluation support and capacity building to 20 Family Self-Sufficiency Demonstration Development (FSSDD) grant recipients. These grant recipients operate many different types of programs for families who are eligible for or at risk of becoming eligible for Temporary Assistance for Needy Families. SEEDS developed resources to support FSSDD grant recipients in conducting research, improving program outcomes, and building evidence capacity. This resource serves as a guide for human services leaders who want to use evidence to inform and improve their programs.

This Center on Budget and Policy Priorities tool includes a compilation of state-by-state eligibility, operations, and outcome data across all 50 states and D.C. on Medicaid, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). It pulls data from a variety of reports on program eligibility criteria, waivers, and other metrics.

The Office of Family Assistance partnered with the Children’s Bureau to develop the Families Are Stronger Together Learning Community (FAST-LC), which focused on preventing family involvement in the child welfare system through developing, implementing, and enhancing Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF)–Child Welfare (CW) partnerships and innovations. FAST-LC was a one-year initiative that involved 10 Tribal and state TANF and CW agencies. 

This tip sheet accompanies a video on Focusing Efforts: Using Shared Data to Define and Advance Prevention Goals, which highlights lessons from the FAST-LC. These resources feature TANF and CW representatives from Oregon and Michigan who discuss how they use shared data to identify families’ needs and enhance their programs to help keep families together.

The Office of Family Assistance partnered with the Children’s Bureau to develop the Families Are Stronger Together Learning Community (FAST-LC), which focused on preventing family involvement in the child welfare system through developing, implementing, and enhancing Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF)–Child Welfare (CW) partnerships and innovations. FAST-LC was a one-year initiative that involved 10 Tribal and state TANF and CW agencies. 

This video accompanies a reflection guide and tip sheet on Focusing Efforts: Using Shared Data to Define and Advance Prevention Goals, which highlights lessons from the FAST-LC. The video features TANF and CW representatives from Oregon and Michigan who discuss how they use shared data to identify families’ needs and enhance their programs to help keep families together.

This Jobs for the Future report explains how and why education and workforce leaders should link public and private education and workforce data to promote economic mobility for all. It also offers guidance on how to forge partnerships that will facilitate that process. The report highlights the various types of data available and what might be accomplished by linking them. The report also provides examples of how public and private data could be combined to develop a deeper understanding of employer demand and the learn-to-earn pipeline.

The "Other" category should only be used for expenditures that cannot be reported in another line item. Expenditures reported in the “Other” category must meet one of the four purposes of TANF. OFA regularly follows up on "Other" category expenditures to ensure proper classification. This resource covers the permissible types of "Other" expenditures:

1. Tribal TANF Programs;
2. Expenditures for Compact of Free Association (COFA) States; and
3. Expenditures That Don't Fit Other Categories (Requires strong justification), such as:
   • Programs combining multiple categories that cannot be meaningfully separated.
   • Services with unique aspects not captured in Lines 6-22.

It helps users understand the proper use of the "Other" category to help avoid misclassifications.