DCL-07-03, SOLICITING FOR PROMISING PRACTICES/GOOD IDEAS

DEAR COLLEAGUE LETTER

DCL-07-03

ATTACHMENT: "Best Practices/Good Ideas in Child Support Enforcement"

DATE: February 2, 2007

TO: ALL STATE AND TRIBAL IV-D DIRECTORS

RE: SOLICITING FOR PROMISING PRACTICES/GOOD IDEAS

Dear Colleague:

I hope you found the recent edition of the Promising Practices Compendium both interesting and useful to your child support program. If you have not seen the Compendium, it can be accessed at http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/cse/pol/2007-im.html. We hope you and your staff will take the time to browse through these short papers which focus on a wide variety of child support issues.

OCSE is now soliciting practices for the next edition of the Promising Practices Compendium. These short papers are usually 2-3 pages long and describe practices developed by States, Tribes, or a locality in a State, which improved the results of their child support program. We are especially interested in practices which address:

Increasing the collection of current support
Management of arrears
Examples of State legislative efforts in the area of medical support
Cost-effective practices in child support programs
Activities in rural areas
Tribal/State collaboration to improve collections – this would be innovative projects that work to reduce high arrearages owed to States by Tribal members. Also medical support rights assigned to the State as a condition of a Tribal member’s receipt of Medicaid
Tribal/State collaboration on arrears prior to case transfer to Tribal Programs and other mechanisms to prevent Tribal Programs from inheriting large arrearages when Tribes begin their child support program
Expediting the review and adjustment process and improving the NCP attendance at meetings and hearings
Techniques for improving customer service
Innovative uses of automation
Outreach to NCPs
Collaboration efforts such as CSE and Access and Visitation, CSE and the courts, CSE and job training referrals, etc. to determine what impact such collaboration may have on increasing collections.
Sharing of Vital Statistics/Department of Health paternity data (systems access) across State lines to help streamline the order establishment process.
Creative and effective media/outreach efforts to Limited English Proficiency/culturally diverse populations and the impact on the program in terms of additional cases and the potential for increased paternity establishments, orders and collections.
Specific success focusing on States that used the data from the Interstate Reconciliation Project to develop an effective/efficient process to do actual case reconciliations.

However, do not let these areas of interest limit your submissions. We welcome other practices which have proven successful in all areas of the child support program or promising ideas which you believe will lead to results.

Attached for your convenience is the format outline that we use. Submissions should be emailed to Sue Sosler at sue.sosler@acf.hhs.gov by April 2, 2007. Please be sure to include the name, email address and phone number of the contact person most familiar with the practice submitted so that colleagues in other States may contact your State representative to learn more about the practice, should they wish.

We look forward to receiving your Promising Practices.

Sincerely,

Margot Bean
Commissioner
Office of Child Support Enforcement

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