Federal Priorities

In addition to advocating on pending legislation and budget proposals, CWDA monitors federal agency regulations and policy changes that affect county human services programs. For the current session of Congress, the CWDA federal priorities include:

  • Recognition of the need to provide adequate federal funding for the services and income support needed by parents seeking to reunify with children who are in foster care.
  • Increased financial support for programs that assist foster youth in the transition to self-sufficiency, including post-emancipation assistance such as secondary education, job training, and access to health care.
  • Recognition in federal law of financial eligibility for kinship permanency alternatives to adoption by relatives, such as guardianship or California's KinGap program. Both the child's maintenance payment and county administrative and supportive services should be eligible for federal reimbursement.
  • Retention of the state’s criminal background check structure for foster parents and relative caregivers, including case-by-case consideration of exemptions based on the child’s safety and best interests.
  • Retention of the entitlement nature of the Title IV-E Foster Care and Adoption Assistance programs and elimination of outdated rules that base the child's eligibility for funds on parental income and circumstances.
  • Legislation to establish funding for a national program of Adult Protective Services that will enable reporting, outreach, intervention, and services to vulnerable disabled and elderly persons in need of protection. Funding should also be available to coordinate with other needed resources, including case management, alternate living arrangements such as assisted living, in-home support services, and for professional staff training.
  • Restoration of full funding for the Social Services Block Grant, which in California is used primarily to augment county and state funded in-home supportive services for elderly and disabled persons, and to coordinate services to disabled children.
  • Restoration of benefits to legal immigrants that were ended by the 1996 welfare reform legislation.
  • Further flexibility for states to align Food Stamps eligibility and processes with state TANF programs.
  • Elimination of proposed federal regulations that would severely curtail states’ ability to appropriately access federal Medicaid funds for services to children and families.

2008 Federal Updates

CWDA retains Waterman & Associates in Washington, DC to advocate its federal priorities. Contact Tom Joseph at tj@wafed.com.

Key Legislation

Adult Services

Children’s Services

Self-Sufficiency

Advocacy Efforts

General

Adult Services

Elder Justice Act

Children’s Services

Self-Sufficiency

Temporary Assistance to Needy Families

Food Stamps (Renamed SNAP effective October 1, 2008)

Medicaid Regulations Moratoria

Deficit Reduction Act Citizenship/Identity Documentation Requirements