In April of 2021, The Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP) reported findings on the effectiveness of mobile responses - “an alternative to using law enforcement to respond to mental health and social crisis.” This week CLASP started a letter to CMS to support these efforts (see following article for what you can do). In the report, CLASP dissects successful mobile response systems
Senator Jacky Rosen (D-NV) and Senator Rob Portman (R-OH) introduced the Helping Foster and Homeless Youth Achieve Act last Thursday, December 9, 2021. CWLA has endorsed the legislation. The bipartisan legislation seeks to improve access to educational opportunities by requiring that higher education institutions receiving federal assistance waive application fees for young people who are
The Senate agreed to a CR extension through February 18, 2022, late Thursday night (November 2) after a week of threats by some Republican senators who objected to the Biden Administration vaccination policies. The House of Representatives reached a deal to extend funding beyond January, as Democrats had originally sought, and they compromised on the
The latest analysis from the Center on Poverty and Social Policy at Colombia University on the impact of the Child Tax Credit (CTC) shows that the October Child Tax Credit payments kept 3.6 million children out of poverty. While that was being released, the advocacy community, including CWLA, are having increased concerns that these same families
On December 1, 2021, ProPublica and The New York Times Magazine published an article titled, ‘They Took Us Away From Each Other’: Lost Inside America’s Shadow Foster System” by reporter Lizzie Presser. The article details what some have labeled diversion from foster care by using informal kinship care placements. It doesn’t question kinship care, but
On Wednesday, December 1, 2021, the Children’s Hospital Association (CHA) and the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) released a summary of data taken between May 21, 2020 through August 26, 2021 across 49 states, New York City (NYC), DC, Puerto Rico (PR), and Guam (GU) detailing COVID-19 data for children. Overall, there were 4,797,683 total child COVID-19 cases reported, despite this overwhelming number, children tend to show less
The House of Representatives passed the Build Back Better Act reconciliation bill (HR 5376) on Friday, November 19, 2021, after a week of waiting. The waiting was driven by the need for a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) “score” or estimation of costs and savings. That score came back on Thursday at the expected $1.7 trillion.
Data released by to CDC on Wednesday, November 17, 2021, confirmed earlier reports that drug overdoses continued to skyrocket with the country reaching 100,000 for the first time in U.S. history. The data measures overdose deaths from May 1, 2020, through April 30, 2021, a big heart of the pandemic. The total is even more
Current funding for federal fiscal year ends on December 3, 2021, and while it appears likely Congress will pass another CR for a matter of weeks, a full year long appropriation adding new funds now seem much in doubt. A CR that extended for the rest of FY 2022 means that there would be a
A coalition of health care associations and providers are starting a campaign to SOUND THE ALARM FOR KIDS: WE ARE IN A NATIONAL MENTAL HEALTH EMERGENCY Organizations can go to the website to join the campaign and access information and social media and other resources to get the message out. The campaign states: “We invite