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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Thursday, April 6, 2006
Contact: ACF Press Office
(202) 401-9215
HHS Approves Child Welfare Waivers for Five States
Initiative to
improve safety, permanency and well-being for children
WASHINGTON, D.C. --- The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) today announced child welfare waiver demonstration projects for California, Florida, Iowa, Michigan and Virginia. The waivers are intended to help states design innovative and flexible approaches to keep children safe from abuse and neglect, to help families address problems that place their children at risk, and to help children in foster care return safely to their own homes or to find safe and permanent homes with an adoptive family, relatives or other guardians with whom they have a close bond.
“All children need permanent and stable homes to develop into healthy, responsible citizens,” said HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt. “By granting these waivers, the Bush Administration is providing greater flexibility to states and greater hope to children.”
The waivers are granted under Section 1130 of the Social Security Act, which authorizes HHS to approve up to 10 new child welfare waiver demonstration projects each year. The waivers for these five states will be the last to be granted under this authorizing statute as the statute expired on March 31. The projects provide states with greater flexibility in their use of federal foster care dollars to ensure improved safety, permanency and well-being for children. In addition, all waivers must be evaluated by a third party and be cost-neutral to the federal government.
“President Bush is dedicated to finding new ways to ensure that children have the opportunity to grow up in safe, stable and loving homes, rather than remaining in foster care for long periods of time,” said HHS Assistant Secretary for Children and Families Wade F. Horn, Ph.D. “These projects will provide five more states with the flexibility they need to support and protect children and strengthen the families who love and care for them.”
The new waiver demonstrations in California, Florida and Michigan will focus on making greater investments in early intervention services, intensive in-home services and other supports to families to protect children and prevent them from being removed from home. The project will also help children already in foster care to return home in a safe and timely manner or, when this is not possible, to move more quickly to a new permanent family.
Two other newly approved waiver demonstrations will enable Iowa and Virginia to use federal foster care funds to pay monthly subsidies to families who assume legal guardianship of children who would otherwise remain in the custody of the state. In order to use these funds, legal guardianships must be established by a court order transferring custody of the child from the state to the family. Families and children participating in these demonstrations will also qualify for additional services such as support groups, respite care and recreational activities for children and families.
Iowa was also approved for a second waiver demonstration to implement a managed care demonstration project focused on providing intensive case planning and services to youth ages 11-16 who are either in or at risk of entering group care. This demonstration seeks to provide services and supports needed to maintain youth with special service needs in their own homes.
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Note: All HHS press releases, fact sheets and other press materials are available at www.hhs.gov/news