From the Government Accountability Office (GAO), this report provides information on an evaluation that the GAO is conducting on the uses of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act). In this report, the GAO provides an update of the status of agencies’ efforts to implement previous GAO recommendations, and also makes new recommendations to improve accountability to the Departments of Education, Transportation (DOT), Energy (DOE), Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Treasury, Labor, and Health and Human Services, and to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).

This report is from MDRC and includes an evaluation of the Family Rewards cash transfer program in New York City, which began in 2007. The program offers cash rewards to specific family activities and outcomes to help families address immediate barriers but also to build human capital. Among the preliminary findings, researchers found that the program reduced current poverty and hardship, including hunger and some housing and health care hardships.

Chapin Hall conducted this study on multi-system families in Illinois and their use of services. Families using two or more social service programs consume 86 percent of the funding allocated for services. Researchers identify characteristics of multi-system families that receive more than one service from five programs, including mental health, substance abuse, foster care, adult incarceration, and juvenile incarceration.

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) authored this report on the TANF program to assess the state of the TANF program in the midst of the economic recession. Of 21 states surveyed, the TANF caseload grew from June 2008 to June 2009 in 12 states. Researchers provide an overview of factors that contributed to the decline in the TANF caseload since 1996 and give demographic data on participating versus nonparticipating families. The GAO concludes with the impact of the high participation more recently in the TANF caseload on child poverty.

On Wednesday, March 24, 2010, the United States Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Office of Family Assistance- Regions V and VII and the United States Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration- Region V hosted an interactive videoconference on the uses of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 to improve summer employment for youth and low-income Americans. In addition, representatives from Los Angeles County presented on the successful use of ARRA funds, their strong TANF-WIA partnership, providing real life examples of how TANF and WIA agencies can work together to serve low-income youth and families with ARRA funds. HHS and DOL officials were on hand to answer questions and facilitate peer to peer dialogue.

The Promising Practices Network (PPN) is a group of individuals and organizations who are dedicated to providing quality evidence-based information about what works to improve the lives of children, families, and communities. The Promising Practices Network features descriptions of evaluated programs that improve outcomes for children. PPN programs can be found under a variety of topic areas, including poverty and welfare.

New York City’s Human Resource Administration designed and implemented the WeCARE program to assist the high number of TANF participants on their caseload with clinical barriers to work; the model has since been successful in moving clients with mental health and other needs off of cash assistance. This 2010 webinar provided TANF stakeholders with information on the program’s creation and implementation. Also available on PeerTA are reports from two site exchanges to WeCARE, with Wisconsin and Hawaii.

The Brookings Institution and the National League of Cities hosted this forum to discuss the current economic climate in relation to urban areas. National economic recovery depends on recovery in metropolitan areas, and the United States cannot begin to rebuild the economy without healthy regional economies. City fiscal concerns are beginning to materialize as many metropolitan areas are facing budget crises. This forum was designed for experts to provide an overview of potential budgetary issues and the outlook for the future.

The following report describes the Urban Partnerships for Welfare Reform Academy II that took place in Minneapolis, Minnesota from October, 26-29 2003 to continue partnerships and foster collaboration to improve service delivery and TANF implementation for families residing in urban areas.

The New York Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance (OTDA) requested technical assistance from the Welfare Peer Technical Assistance Network to help design and implement effective strategies to mitigate the effects of the recent economic downturn on low-income families. OTDA requested assistance in identifying strategies that other jurisdictions have taken to respond to the recession and how they have successfully utilized the TANF provisions of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). A peer-to-peer roundtable was convened in Albany, New York July 14-15, 2009 during the National Association of Welfare Research and Statistics (NAWRS) Conference in order to highlight state perspectives and to document state uses of the TANF-related components of ARRA and effective strategies for implementation.