February 2002 - Vol. 4, No. 1

• Bush and Democrats Introduce TANF and Child Support Proposals
• Racial Disparities in Juvenile Confinement Addressed In Successful Demonstration
• Comparison of States' TANF Spending Available
• New Poverty Guidelines Published by HHS
• Federal Court Rules Against Public Funding of Faith-Based Initiative
• Resources Available to Aid Practitioners and Advocates

Bush and Democrats Introduce TANF and Child Support Proposals

On February 4, the Bush administration released its budget, which includes proposals related to TANF and child support. On January 23, Representative Benjamin Cardin (D-MD) and four Democratic co-sponsors introduced H.R. 3625, the Next Step in Reforming Welfare Act. In addition, Representative Patsy Mink (D-HI) currently has 68 co-sponsors of her bill, the TANF Reauthorization Act of 2002, which is expected to be introduced in the Senate soon by Senator Paul Wellstone (D-MN). While all of these proposals contend with a full range of issues related to TANF, the primary provisions on child support are compared below.

* An earlier version of the bill would have limited the assignment to the number of months on assistance multiplied by the amount of the monthly child support order, which would have resulted in a significantly lower total, and one that was tied to the ability of the noncustodial parent to pay such a debt. When assigned child support is paid by the noncustodial parent, it is retained by the state as reimbursement of welfare costs.

* Without a disregard, the TANF benefit is reduced based on the amount of the child support payment. Previous versions of the bill have tied the incentive to a state's adoption of a disregard policy. In its current form, the bill could allow states to pay out no additional money to families when child support is paid by the noncustodial parent, while still benefiting from a reduced federal share of child support collections.

Other Bush proposals include:

• The establishment of a $25 annual fee to the child support agency that states would be required to charge custodial parents who are not on welfare for child support enforcement services. This fee would apply to a population of custodial parents the majority of whom have incomes at or below 250% of poverty.
• More frequent review and adjustment of child support orders by states. It is believed that this would result in increased child support orders and a savings to the state and federal government. The savings would result from additional collections retained by the government to repay welfare costs.
• Allow for increased interception of Old Age Survivors Disability Insurance (OASDI) payments to pay child support debt to the custodial parent or to the state and federal government.
• Lower the point of child support debt at which noncustodial parents can be denied a passport from $5,000 to $2,500.

The Cardin bill also proposes to:

• Prohibit the recovery of Medicaid costs for the birth of a child for whom support rights have been assigned. Thirty-nine states have statutes allowing for the collection of these costs.

More specific TANF proposals are expected from the administration soon. For a full summary of the Bush budget proposal, see The TANF-Related Provisions in the President's Budget, at www.cbbp.org. The Cardin bill and the Mink bill have been referred to the House Committee on Ways and Means, and can be viewed at www.thomas.gov.

Racial Disparities in Juvenile Confinement Addressed In Successful Demonstration

Responding to clear evidence that the system for confining youth results in significant disparities by race, a demonstration in Multnomah County, Oregon has crafted a system that significantly reduces the disparities. The demonstration sought to address striking differences in juvenile detention that have been found in several recent studies (see, for example, the May 200 Policy Briefing at www.cffpp.org, for a summary of one major recent study), including:

• Between 1983 and 1997, the overall youth detention population increased by 47%, but the detained white youth population increased by 21%, while the detained minority youth population grew by 76%.
• Disparities increase at every stage of the juvenile justice process. For all youth with no prior admissions to public facilities who were charged with the same offenses, African-American youth were 6 times more likely and Latino youth were 3 times more likely than white youth to be incarcerated.

The demonstration sought to address the points at which race was a factor in determining the ultimate confinement of juveniles through a series of activities:

• The Multnomah County leaders, including a 'Disproportionate Minority Confinement Committee' chaired by a juvenile court judge and made up of representatives from the police department, district attorney, public schools, county commission, juvenile justice department (probation), and Portland State University, made it a county priority to develop detention reform strategies in a comprehensive way.
• Alternatives to detentions, such as shelter care, foster homes, home detention and a day reporting center were established both as an alternative to detention and to prevent youth from returning to detention for violation of parole.
• A risk assessment instrument was carefully designed with input from all represented groups in order to provide a standard, less subjective basis for detention decisions. A new detention intake team reviewed every single youth in detention each day and considered their risk assessment scores, their case status and whether they were appropriate for placement in community-based alternatives.
• A new, less subjective, system for dealing with probation violators was developed in order to improve consistency across staff and to allow for a series of sanctions to be used as an alternative to detention for violating parole.
• Four half-time trial assistants were hired to help attorneys improve the pretrial placement planning for juveniles. This helped to reduce the disparity in legal representation that resulted in fewer white defendants being placed in detention.

The reforms had a striking impact on detention rates in general and on racial disparities in detention for the county. In 1993, prior to the reforms, the average daily detention population was 92. As the reforms were implemented, detention rates dropped, and by 2000, the average daily population in detention had been reduced to 33. Racial disparities dropped from an 11% difference between African Americans (24%) and whites and a 10% difference between Latinos (24%) and whites in the likelihood that an arrested youth would be detained at some point in his or her case. By 2000, the differentials dropped to 3% for African Americans (12% v. 9% for whites) and 2% for Latinos (11%).

The report, Reducing Disproportionate Minority Confinement: The Multnomah County, Oregon Success Story and its Implications, written by the Justice Policy Institute, was released January 23, 2002, and is available on the web at www.cjcj.org.

Comparison of States' TANF Spending Available

Several new sources of information provide state-by-state analyses of TANF spending, welfare rules and policies. The sites could constitute a useful base from which to compare a particular state to all others, to advocate at the state level for a particular use of funds or policy change, or to make a case for funding a program.

• The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has published its fiscal year 2000 data concerning use of federal TANF and state maintenance of effort (MOE) funds in FY 2000. The reports provide total amounts spent by states on TANF and TANF-related activities. They are available at: http://www.acf.dhhs.gov/programs/ofs/data/index.html.
• For an explanation and analysis of the HHS data (but not including the 4th quarter of 2000) and state-by-state charts, go to http://www.clasp.org/pubs/TANF/FY00/Introduction.htm.
• The Welfare Rules Database (WRD) is a fully searchable database of welfare rules in place for all 50 states and the District of Columbia for each year from 1996 through July 31, 2000. The database is available to the public from the Urban Institute's Assessing the New Federalism project at http://anfdata.urban.org/drsurvey/login.cfm?CFID=19762&CFTOKEN=57393190.
• A free printed copy of the State of the States 2001 is available from stateline.org. The report catalogs significant state-level developments on key issues such as healthcare, education, tax and budget policy and welfare reform. The report is not available on the web but can be requested by email to managingeditor@stateline.org. They will need your postal address.

New Poverty Guidelines Published by HHS

The federal poverty guidelines, which are used in determining financial eligibility for certain federal programs and are updated each year, have been updated as follows:

The guidelines and definitions are available at http://aspe.hhs.gov/poverty/02poverty.htm

Federal Court Rules Against Public Funding of Faith-Based Initiative

In the first court ruling in the nation against unrestricted taxpayer funding of a faith-based social service agency, Judge Barbara Crabb, of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin ruled on January 8, 2002, that the funding stream violated the establishment clause. The program, Faith Works, operates a long term treatment facility for male addicts that requires men enrolled in its program to attend onsite "faith-enhanced" Alcoholics Anonymous counseling, with chapel and bible studies part of the routine schedule. Faith Works received national exposure in July of 2000 when presidential candidate George W. Bush made a campaign stop there, and singled the religious ministry out as the type of program he intended to promote as president.

Faith Works has received nearly $1 million from the State of Wisconsin, most of which derives from the governor's discretionary funds through the TANF block grant. The group was first funded in 1998 and 1999 with unrestricted awards from then-governor Tommy Thompson. Thompson recruited the program's director from New York City, providing a commitment of public funds that allowed for the start-up of the program.

In response to Faith Works' argument that its religious components were covered through private funding, Judge Crabb noted, "The Supreme Court has systematically rejected attempts to unbundle religious activities through statistics and accountingÉ Defendants neglect to point out that they used the integration of religion into Faith Works' recovery model as a strong selling point for obtaining funding. . . . Faith Works cannot now try to excise religion from its offerings, saying that it contracted with the state to provide the wholly secular services of room and board without any reference to religion."

Plaintiffs in the lawsuit are the Freedom From Religion Foundation Inc., Anne Nicol Gaylor, Annie Laurie Gaylor and Dan Barker. Representing the Foundation is attorney Richard Bolton. The lawsuit was first filed in October 2000. The case is Freedom From Religion Foundation, Inc. v. Scott McCallum, 00-C-617-C, January 7, 2001.

Resources Available to Aid Practitioners and Advocates

• A full range of informational materials on the Earned Income Tax Credit, an important source of additional income to low-income workers, is available at no cost. The 2002 Earned Income Tax Credit Outreach Kit can be ordered in a variety of languages from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. http://www.cbpp.org/eic2002/index.html
• A Sentence of Their Own is a documentary film that portrays one family's traumatic experience as they contend with a father and husband who is incarcerated. The film provides a closer examination and deeper understanding of the growing use of incarceration, and its impact on families and communities. The film was made possible by the Open Society Institute's Center on Crime, Communities & Culture. For more information, go to http://www.asentenceoftheirown.com.