On Tuesday, January 27, Capitol Hill was the scene of a briefing and a report-release by the Children's Advocacy Institute and First Star that leveled heavy criticism of federal oversight of the nation’s child welfare services. The report, Shame On U.S , details an examination of the federal government and its oversight of the nation’s
On Tuesday, The Children’s Defense Fund released a new report called Ending Child Poverty Now highlighting proposals they say could end child poverty, as defined by the Supplemental Poverty measure. CDF argues that we can make this happen by investing another 2 percent of the federal budget to improve existing programs and policies that increase
Last week the House of Representatives on suspension of the rule (a fast-track vote process) passed a dozen bills intended to address or help combat human trafficking while improving services to survivors. The one most significant to child welfare would amend the Child Abuse Prevention and treatment Act (CAPTA). H.R. 469 – Strengthening Child Welfare Response
Last week the office of Community Services released two new annual reports on the Social Services Block Grant (SSBG). The 2011 and 2012 reports show similar results as the 2010 report and reaffirms how the $1.7 billion in funding continues to support a range of child welfare services—especially as a prime funder of child
On Thursday, January 22, the President’ released a child care expansion proposal to build on his support for an expanded child care tax credit first announced at the state of the Union Address on Tuesday of last week. Under the new proposal the President would provide significant increases to the child care block grant, the
One early indication of the level of bipartisanship may come this week as the Senate HELP Committee uses its first full committee hearing to focus on the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). The ESEA was last reauthorized in 2002 as the No Child Left Behind Act but it expired in 2007.
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) has issued a report, TANF Action Is Needed to Better Promote Employment-Focused Approaches that concludes there are effective strategies to move adults from public assistance (TANF) to work but that the current law and funding are limiting the use of these strategies by states. The GAO looked at ten programs,
The 114th Congress began last week formalizing the leadership choices and committee assignments and setting in motion some early legislative actions in both houses. This week the Senate is expected to begin debate on an approval of the Keystone pipeline. The debate is expected to take up to two weeks. On the House side members
The new 114th Congress will begin this week on Tuesday. Most of the week will be about conducting the formal start up actions. That start up includes the selection of the various leaders, all returning from the last Congress with the Senate leaders swapping their majority/minority roles. We will also see the formal selection of
The next Congress will have the opportunity to reauthorize more than a dozen programs that have a significant impact on children but whether that happens seems less than likely. Generally federal programs are reauthorized for periods of four to five years. The reauthorization process is intended as a way to provide needed oversight but in