NOTE: Hyperlinks provided in this policy fax briefing were correct as of the time of publication.

October 2000 - Vol. 2, No 8

• Urban Institute Reports on Status of Low-Income Fathers
• Violence Against Women Act Passes Both Houses
• California Governor Vetoes Child Support Amnesty Program
• Accuracy of Paternity Acknowledgments Questioned
• New Findings On Poverty Released
• States Stand To Lose $1.9 Billion in Federal Funds For Chip
• Child Support Data Report Reveals Amount Of Child Support Distributed To Welfare Families

Urban Institute Reports on Status of Low-Income Fathers

The Urban Institute has issued a new report on nonresident fathers, A Look at Poor Dads Who Don't Pay Support. Using data from the National Survey of America's Families, authors Elaine Sorensen and Chava Zibman find that:

• An estimated 7.2 million men identify themselves as nonresident fathers. Of these, 2.6 million (36.1%) are low-income (income below the poverty level), with a limited ability to provide support to their children.
• Nearly all nonresident fathers who pay formal child support have incomes above the poverty level. Only 3% of nonresident fathers who are poor pay child support.
• Approximately 25% of low-income fathers who do not pay child support are incarcerated. Almost 40% of the fathers who do not pay child support and are not working are incarcerated.
• Low-income nonpaying fathers who worked in 1996 averaged just 29 full-time weeks of work in a year. Average earned income for these working fathers was $5,750.
• Among the barriers to employment encountered by low-income nonpaying fathers are:
  • Education: 42% did not graduate from high school or obtain a G.E.D.
  • Employment History: Almost one-third had not held a job in more than three years.
  • Health: 42% had at least one health-related barrier.
  • Telephone Access: 32% lived in a household that did not have a telephone.
• Only 16% of low-income nonpaying fathers receive food stamp benefits. Perhaps related to this low participation rate is the six-month time limit established in 1996 on food stamp receipt for "able-bodied childless adults."
• Only 12% of these fathers had private health insurance.

The report, which contains similar data on custodial parents who do not receive child support, is available on the web at http:/federalism.urban.org/html/whatnew.html.

Violence Against Women Act Passes Both Houses

The Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) Reauthorization bill (H.R. 1248) was passed with a vote of 95-0 on October 11, 2000. President Clinton is reportedly eager to sign the bill and thus immediately reauthorize funding for the services that expired under the original VAWA on September 30, 2000. The recent legislation will allocate $3.3 billion in funds for five more years to cover battered women's shelters, a national domestic violence hotline, and training for police officers, prosecutors, and health professionals that were funded under VAWA in 1994. Improvements to the original landmark legislation include protection for battered immigrant women, attention to dating violence, and provision for transitional housing, supervised visitation centers and civil legal assistance and judicial education.

California Governor Vetoes Child Support Amnesty Program

California's proposed child support amnesty program (described in last month's Policy Fax Briefing) was vetoed by Democratic Governor Gray Davis on September 24, 2000, after passing in the California Senate and Assembly in August. In his veto message, the Governor expressed concern that the short-term costs of implementing the amnesty would not result in assured savings in terms of increased child support collections.

Accuracy of Paternity Acknowledgments Questioned

Milwaukee County Director of Child Support Enforcement John P. Hayes is quoted in a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article as saying "Anyone who doesn't ask for a (paternity) test is a fool." Mr. Hayes stated that from his experience, such tests tend to clear about one in five men alleged to be fathers. The remarks come in a year (1999) in which the number of paternities established reached an all-time high of 1.5 million, and during a period in which procedures to voluntarily acknowledge paternity have been made simpler and faster. The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunities Reconciliation Act (PROWRA) included a requirement that states establish paternity for 90% of the welfare recipient caseload, and later child support enforcement legislation emphasizes paternity establishment rates in awarding child support incentive funding to states. Both of these policies encourage states and localities to establish paternities at higher rates, and increase the risk that such paternities will be established in error.

New Findings On Poverty Released

The Commerce Department of the Census Bureau released a report on September 26, 2000 stating that the poverty rate in the US is the lowest in 20 years at 11.8% in 1999 and that the median household income of $40,000 was at a record high. There were discrepancies by race, however, with poverty levels of 23.6% for African Americans, 22.8% for Hispanics, and 7.7% for whites. The poverty rates for white and Hispanic families are at record lows while the rate has remained unchanged for African Americans. In response to the Census Bureau report, the Children's Defense Fund (CDF) states that while the number of poor children has decreased since 1998, 12.1 million still live in poverty. In addition, the profile of poor families is changing, as the percentage of poor children living in working families has increased in each of the last six years to 77% in 1999.

States Stand To Lose $1.9 Billion in Federal Funds For Chip

The Census Bureau report can be obtained on the web at www.census.gov. The Children's Defense Fund information is available at www.childrensdefense.org.

Forty states face losing almost half of their federal allotment under the State Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP). Considered to be the most significant expansion of subsidized health care coverage since the inception of Medicaid and Medicare in 1965, CHIP was created in 1997 to provide health insurance for children with family incomes too high to be eligible for Medicaid, but too low to afford private health insurance. States were given three years to spend fiscal year 1998's money, but forty states were unable to do so by the September 30, 2000 deadline. The New York Times has suggested the states' loss of funds are due to fewer eligible children in the current strong economy, states' inability to put up matching funds, complicated forms that discouraged eligible families from applying, and stringent federal guidelines that prevent eligibility for numbers of uninsured children. However, a report issued by the Urban Institute in September 2000 states the following:

• The ten states that were able to spend their FY 1998 allotment in the three-year period already had a comparable state health program in place. It took the other states one or two years to develop the program and recruit eligible participants.
• The design of funding, with more federal money given in the start-up years and decreased funding in subsequent years, presented a challenge to states to spend their allotments during a period of program development. Funding drops off in future years, constituting a threat that states will actually run short on resources as their programs continue to grow.

The authors urge that the reallocation of unspent funds be responsive to states' changing spending patterns and needs as they develop their programs in the coming years.

Child Support Data Report Reveals Amount Of Child Support Distributed To Welfare Families

The federal Office of Child Support Enforcement has issued its preliminary Fiscal Year 1999 data report, with financial and statistical information on the program. Notable in the report is OCSE's accounting for the distribution of collected child support: of $1.5 billion in child support collected on behalf current TANF and Foster Care cases, $1.377 billion (91%) was retained by the state and federal government, and $112 million (8%) was distributed to families. For each dollar of total child support enforcement administrative expenditures, less than one dollar of child support was collected on behalf of TANF and Foster Care families. The report, Child Support Enforcement FY 1999 Preliminary Data Report, is available on-line at www.acf.dhhs.gov/programs/cse.