Department of Health and Human Services: Improving Services for Children and Families

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Abstract

This chapter was part of an online effort by the Center for American Progress Action Fund and New Democracy Project to offer expert advice to the new administration as part of its Change for America book project (http://www.americanprogressaction.org/issues/2008/changeforamerica/additionalcontributions.html). Washington’s new leadership, its authors say, should build on the Administration for Children and Families’ assets and focus on the interrelated goals of promoting family economic security and promoting healthy child and youth development. These twin goals can best be achieved through new strate­gic investments, capacity building and innovative partnerships, coordination across offices and departments, and collaboration with states and the private sector.

Introduction

The new president and secretary of health and human services will face major challenges relating to families’ economic security and children’s development, opportunities, and preparedness for school and the workforce. The Administration for Children and Families, with its 2008 enacted budget of more than $47 billion, should play a key role in the response. ACF oversees some of the federal government’s largest and most significant service programs for families, including Head Start; child care subsidies for low-income working families; services for runaway and homeless youth; Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, also known as welfare; child support; child welfare services; the Community Services and Social Services Block Grants; and the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, or LIHEAP. This chapter is part of an online effort by the Center for American Progress Action Fund and New Democracy Project to offer expert advice to the new administration as part of its Change for America book project.

Smaller programs support services for refugees, the developmentally disabled, and Native Americans, among others. The new administration should build on these assets and focus on the interrelated goals of promoting family economic security and promoting healthy child and youth development. These twin goals can best be achieved through new strategic investments, capacity building and innovative partnerships, coordination across offices and departments, and collaboration with states and the private sector.

The economy’s effect on struggling families is likely to be front and center for the incoming administration. Many (though not all) ACF programs focus on helping families with children whose circumstances today are fragile and could worsen through the winter depending on trends in food prices, fuel prices, the housing and rental markets, unemployment, and lack of health insurance. About 39 percent of the nation’s children—nearly 29 million in 2006—live in families with low incomes (defined as incomes below twice the official poverty level).1 Most of these families are working hard but still struggling; about 70 percent of low-income families with children have at least one parent working regularly.

Even before the recent economic slowdown, some of these families experienced difficulty making ends meet, including skimping on food, housing, and medical care. Earlier this decade, about 30 percent of low-income families with regular workers reported having difficulty stretching food through the month, and a similar portion reported difficulty paying the rent, mortgage, or utilities—even before the subprime mortgage crisis. Families without regular workers fare even worse.

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