Family First Prevention Services Act of 2016

Ways and Means Chairman Kevin Brady

http://waysandmeans.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/BUCHAN_031_xml2.pdf

Family First Prevention Services Act of 2016
Strengthen families by providing evidence-based prevention services to
keep children out of foster care and reduce inappropriate group home
placements.
This proposal would:
 Strengthen families and reduce unnecessary foster care placements by
allowing states to use federal foster care dollars to pay for up to 12 months
of family services to prevent children from needing to enter foster care.
Biological families, adoptive families, and families in which a relative is
caring for the child would all be eligible for services, if needed to keep the
child safely at home. Only prevention services classified as “promising,”
“supported,” or “well-supported,” based on an evidence structure developed
by the California Evidence-Based Clearinghouse, would be eligible for
reimbursement. These services would include:

 o Mental health services;

 o Substance abuse services; and

 o In-home parent “skill-based” programs (parent training, home
visiting, individual and family therapy)

I love this one! It's about time!
 Ensure more foster children are placed with families by ending federal
reimbursement when states inappropriately place children in non-family
settings, such as group homes or congregate care facilities. To be eligible for
federal payment:

 o The state would have to assess the child’s needs and determine the
non-family setting was the most appropriate, subject to ongoing
judicial approval.

o Non-family settings would be subject to licensing and accreditation
standards to ensure they provide appropriate supervision and have the
necessary clinical staff to address their needs.
Prepared by the Human Resources Subcommittee Staff

 Support family relationships by allowing states to receive a partial match for
evidence-based Kinship Navigator programs to help children remain with
family members whenever possible. Kinship Navigator programs provide
information, referral, and follow-up services to grandparents and other
relatives who unexpectedly assume caregiver responsibility for children who
cannot remain safely with their parents. 

 Help families stay together by reauthorizing the Regional Partnership Grant
program, which provides funding to state and regional grantees seeking to
provide evidence-based services to prevent child abuse and neglect related to
substance abuse. Grant requirements would be updated based on lessons
learned from the most effective past grants. In addition, the bill updates the
program to specifically address the opioid and heroin epidemic and leverage
what’s been learned to ensure that new foster care prevention funding
provided under the bill is used effectively.

 Improve support for the transition to adulthood by updating the John H.
Chafee Foster Care Independence Program to allow states the option of
continuing to assist older former foster youth up to age 23, including
providing education and training vouchers.

 Reduce the amount of time foster children wait to be adopted, placed with
relatives, or placed with foster parents by incorporating reforms in the
bipartisan House-passed H.R. 4472, which encourages states to use
electronic systems when placing children across state lines.

 Help relative caregivers avoid bureaucracy by promoting best practices for
states by providing model foster care licensing standards with a focus on
ensuring states promote placements with family members for children in
care. Keeping children with family members, when possible, improves
outcomes for children and families.

  Support existing child welfare services by extending for five years the
Promoting Safe and Stable Families and Child Welfare Services programs
(each in title IV-B of the Social Security Act) as well as the Adoption and
Legal Guardianship Incentive Payments, whose authorizations are set to
expire at the end of the fiscal year

 Delay final implementation of additional federal reimbursement for the
adoptions of infants and toddlers to allow for a Government Accountability
Office (GAO) review. The study will examine compliance with the
Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act of 2008
(P.L. 110-135) requirement that states reinvest the state funds freed up by
providing additional federal reimbursement. All adoptive families would
remain eligible for either state or federally-funded services, and adoptive
families with a child at risk of reentering foster care would be newly eligible
for evidence-based prevention services provided under this bill.
Savings:
The Congressional Budget Office preliminarily estimates that the cost of the upfront
prevention services to strengthen families would be more than fully offset by
reducing inappropriate group home placements and the short delay in providing
additional funding to states for adoption assistance to allow the GAO review to be
completed.
Over the long term, providing evidence-based prevention services has been shown
to reduce the need for costly, long-term foster care and improve outcomes for
children and families.