The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families (ACF), Office of Family Assistance (OFA) hosted the 2013 Tribal TANF--Child Welfare Coordination Projects Annual Grantee Meeting on August 14-15, 2013 in Denver, Colorado. The meeting provided Tribal TANF--Child Welfare Coordination Project grantees with the opportunity to share information with their peers regarding their program structure and performance. The meeting also addressed grant requirements for Year Two of the projects, strategies for building coalitions in Native American communities, home visiting programs, program sustainability, and approaches for documenting cross-agency coordination and collaboration.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families (ACF), Office of Family Assistance (OFA), Division of Tribal TANF Management hosted the first national Tribal TANF Summit to Improve Program Performance and Strengthen Native Families on August 12-14, 2013 in Denver, Colorado. The workshop focused on Tribal TANF program administration and participant engagement. Experts from the field shared information on a variety of topics including: career pathways and subsidized employment, TANF policies and procedures, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, opportunities for economic development, and effective prevention and treatment programs for substance abuse and co-occurring disorders.

States and jurisdictions work with Tribes on child welfare issues in many different ways. In some cases, Tribes run their own child welfare systems; in other instances, Tribes receive different degrees of funding and services from the State or counties. In all cases, workers from non-Tribal cultural backgrounds will benefit from learning about Indian history, relevant Federal laws, and cultural considerations. This resource page from the Child Welfare Information Gateway is designed to help non-Indian child welfare workers and agencies find resources on issues relevant to working with American Indian and Alaska Native children and families.

The National Resource Center for Tribes (NRC4Tribes), a member of the Children’s Bureau, Child Welfare Training and Technical Assistance Network, recently conducted a needs assessment of practices within Tribal child welfare among federally recognized American Indian and Alaskan Native Tribes. The report summarizes the need for specific technical assistance in five main areas within Tribal child welfare programs: (1) Tribal child welfare practice, (2) foster care and adoption, (3) the Indian Child Welfare Act, (4) legal and judicial, and (5) Tribal child welfare operations. Overall, the report recognized the need for a strengthened culturally-based Tribal Child Welfare infrastructure that provided increased communication between Tribes in order to share practices and knowledge as well as effective staff recruitment and training. The report also provides an overview of Tribal child welfare programs and a summary of the methods exercised in conducting the needs assessment.

This resource guide was designed to support child welfare workers, supervisors, administrators, and other professionals that work with American Indian families. From the Rocky Mountain Quality Improvement Center, this guide offers strategies for best practices in serving these families with both child protection and substance abuse concerns.

This issue brief was developed by the Child Welfare Information Gateway and offers information to help States and Tribes work effectively together to serve families. Authors examine the key factors that affect Tribal-State relations in child welfare and provide promising practices for effective collaboration.

This series of reports, completed as part of a two-year study by James Bell Associates, describes how tribes use flexible Federal funds for the Promoting Safe and Stable Families program. The reports highlight promising practices tribes have adopted to meet unique challenges they face in managing services to strengthen tribal families, children, and youth. This report is labeled as Issue Paper #1.

This newsletter, from the Family and Youth Services Bureau, gives information on how youth in tribes are often best served through culturally-specific programs. Currently, more than a third of the Native American community is under the age of 18, which makes it important to work with the tribal youth. Tribes are currently working with Family and Youth Services Bureau in an effort to better serve Native youth and families.