February 2007
Volume 6, Number 2
In this Issue:
President Bush’s FY 2008 Budget and Its Implications for Prevention Programs
--Prevent Child Abuse America Priority: Appropriations
--Prevent Child Abuse America Priority: Home Visitation Legislation
--Prevent Child Abuse America Priority: SCHIP Reauthorization
--Prevent Child Abuse America Priority: Investing in Child Welfare Services
--How Other Programs Affecting Children and Families Fared in the President's Budget
Senators Bond and Clinton Re-introduce Home Visitation Bill
UNICEF Report Highlights Need For U.S. To Make Better Choices for Our Children
President Bush’s FY 2008 Budget and Its Implications for Prevention Programs
Earlier this month, President Bush submitted his fiscal year (FY) 2008 budget request to Congress, marking the official beginning of the budget season. Below is a summary of how key programs fared in the President’s budget, beginning with programs directly related to Prevent Child Abuse America’s 2007 Legislative Priorities.
PREVENT CHILD ABUSE AMERICA LEGISLATIVE PRIORITY: Increase funding for child abuse and neglect prevention services (i.e. CAPTA, PSSF, and SSBG)
Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA): CAPTA provides funding for the prevention of child maltreatment through three types of grants:
- CAPTA state grants: State grants provide funds for states to improve child protective services. In previous requests, the President has supported increasing the program to $42 million. An increase to the state grants would shorten the time that post-investigative services are delivered, and increase the number of children and families who receive these services.
President’s budget proposal: Level funds state grants at $27 million.
Prevent Child Abuse America's request: Fund state grants at no less than $42 million.
- CAPTA community-based grants: These grants help states develop and implement effective approaches to preventing child abuse and neglect. An increase would provide communities with additional support to implement effective prevention strategies such as parenting education, home visiting programs, mutual self-help support groups for parents, and crisis nurseries.
President’s budget proposal: Level funds community-based grants at $43 million.
Prevent Child Abuse America's request: Fund community-based grants at no less than $65 million.
- CAPTA discretionary research and demonstration grants: These grants fund for data collection, technical assistance, and grant-funded research and demonstration projects.
President's budget proposal: Provides a $10 million increase under the heading “Investing in Nurse Home Visitation Programs.” Budget documents indicate that this additional funding will be used to “provide incentives to states, local governments, or non-profit organizations to use a greater share of existing Federal and non-Federal funding streams to adopt and expand evidence-based home visitation programs for new low-income mothers and their children.”
Prevent Child Abuse America's request: Prevent Child Abuse America supports the increased funding but encourages Congress and the Administration to ensure that a range of home visitation models benefit from the provision.
Promoting Safe and Stable Families (PSSF): Otherwise known as title IV-B (2) of the Social Security Act, PSSF grants help states pay for four “core” programs: family support, family preservation, family reunification, and adoption support. States are expected to spend 20% of their allotment on each service category. Prevention efforts in some states are paid for using PSSF family support dollars. PSSF consists of two funding streams, one mandatory and one discretionary.
President's budget proposal: Level funds the discretionary grant at $89 million (along with full mandatory funding for core programming of $305 million).
Prevent Child Abuse America's request: Fully fund the discretionary grant at $200 million (along with full mandatory funding for core programming of $305 million).
Social Services Block Grant (SSBG): SSBG is a capped entitlement that funds a range of social services for children, families, the elderly, and the disabled. Services funded by SSBG dollars include child abuse prevention, child care, and adoption assistance. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) reports that SSBG funded preventive services for 29 percent of the total child recipients of preventive services in 2004. SSBG funding has been chipped away over the past decade from a high of $2.8 billion a year to its current authorized level of $1.7 billion a year.
President’s budget proposal: Funds the program at $1.2 billion, a $500 million cut.
Prevent Child Abuse America's request: Fully fund SSBG at $1.7 billion.
PREVENT CHILD ABUSE AMERICA LEGISLATIVE PRIORITY: Increase Congressional Support for Home Visiting Legislation
The Education Begins at Home Act (EBAH) seeks to establish a new federal funding stream and was not included in the President’s budget. EBAH has just been re-introduced in the Senate (see article below). Prevent Child Abuse America fully supports EBAH and will work diligently this year towards enactment.
PREVENT CHILD ABUSE AMERICA LEGISLATIVE PRIORITY: Reauthorize the State Children’s Health Insurance Program
The State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) is up for reauthorization this year, for the first time in ten years. This program has been crucial in helping states to expand health insurance coverage to uninsured children who are not eligible for Medicaid. Advocates estimate that a $15 billion increase over five years would be necessary just to maintain the current enrollment levels, with much more funding needed to expand coverage to the millions of children still in need of insurance coverage.
President’s budget proposal: Provides a $5 Billion increase to the program over five years and limits SCHIP coverage to children at or below 200% of the poverty level.
Prevent Child Abuse America's request: Prevent Child Abuse America urges Congress to reauthorize SCHIP this year at an adequate funding level with the goal of seeing legislation enacted that increases rather than restricts children’s access to health care.
PREVENT CHILD ABUSE AMERICA LEGISLATIVE PRIORITY: Increase Federal Investments in the Full Continuum of Child Welfare Services
In recent years, congressional deliberations have focused on alternative ways to alter the federal child welfare financing structure. Currently, title IV-E is an uncapped entitlement program in which funding is provided based on the number of children eligible to receive the foster care dollars. Funding levels increase and decrease automatically based on need.
President’s budget proposal: Would give states the option of receiving title IV-E foster care funds as a block grant which would provide a fixed allocation amount.
Prevent Child Abuse America's request: Prevent Child Abuse America will continue to evaluate proposals with the dual policy objectives of securing adequate, guaranteed funding for front-end, prevention services and ensuring an effective approach to child welfare that is comprehensive and provides for a full continuum of care.
HOW OTHER PROGRAMS AFFECTING CHILDREN AND FAMILIES FARED IN THE PRESIDENT'S BUDGET
Child Care Level Funded: Like PSSF, the Child Care Development Fund (CCDF) consists of a mandatory funding stream, and a discretionary funding stream. The President’s request level-funds child care mandatory funding at $2.9 billion and discretionary funding at $2.062 billion.
Community Services Block Grant Eliminated: CSBG provides grants to local programs designed to alleviate poverty by helping poor people obtain the resources and skills necessary to become economically independent.
Compassion Capital Fund Increased: The FY 2008 budget provides $75 million (an $11 million increase over the FY 2007 appropriated level) for the Compassion Capital Fund, which provides training and capacity-building and technical assistance for grassroots faith-based and community-based organizations.
Early Childhood Programs Eliminated: The President’s FY 2008 budget request eliminates funding for a number of early childhood programs including: Even Start; Parent Information Resource Centers (PIRCs); and Foundations for Learning.
Food Stamp Eligibility Changes Proposed: The Administration’s budget proposes eliminating Food Stamp eligibility for approximately 300,000 low-income working families by changing the eligibility criteria for the program and eliminating many of the conditions under which states have previously been permitted to waive eligibility requirements for certain applicants.
Head Start Cut: In the CR that establishes funding levels for the remainder of FY 2007, Head Start received a $100 million increase, funding the program at $6.88 billion. The President’s FY 2008 budget request would return Head Start funding to the FY 2006 level of $6.78 billion.
Healthy Marriage and Family Formation Fully Funded: TANF reauthorization enacted in early 2006 authorized $150 million per year for 5 years in competitive grants to develop and implement healthy marriage promotion and responsible fatherhood programs. Up to $50 million per year of that allocation may be used for fatherhood initiatives. The Administration proposes fully funding these grants at $150 million in FY 2008.
Juvenile Justice Programs Cut and Consolidated: The proposal eliminates the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention and consolidates juvenile justice programs into one $254 million block grant called the Child Safety and Juvenile Justice Program. If enacted, this would result in a $70 million cut from FY 2007 funding levels.
LIHEAP Cut: While energy costs for consumers have continued to rise, the Administration’s budget proposal includes a substantial cut to the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP). This program provides critical financial assistance to millions of our nation’s low-income families so that they can cover heating and cooling costs for their homes. The National Energy Assistance Directors’ Association estimates that the President’s proposed cut would result in approximately 1 million families losing their assistance.
Senators Bond and Clinton Re-introduce Home Visitation Bill
We are happy to report that Senators Kit Bond (R-MO) and Hillary Clinton (D-NY) re-introduced the Education Begins at Home Act (EBAH) on February 16th. EBAH would establish the first dedicated federal funding stream to support parents with newborns and young children through quality, voluntary home visitation. If enacted, this legislation would extend to a broad range of families the opportunity to benefit from home visiting programs like Healthy Families America.
Senators Bond and Clinton made some important changes from previous iterations of the Senate bill, including stronger language and support for program evaluation and the removal of any references to specific home visitation program models. These changes bring the legislation more closely aligned with the bill introduced in the House in the last Congress by Representatives Danny Davis (D-IL-7) and Todd Platts (R-PA-19).
Other changes from previous EBAH bills include:
- New language to ensure greater participation of fathers;
- New language clarifying that grandparents and other relatives serving as primary caregivers as well as foster parents would be eligible to receive home visitation services;
- The addition of a new section requiring the Secretary of Health and Human Services to develop a public education campaign regarding proper care for children under five and to ensure that parents of newborns are given the opportunity to participate in a single session parenting class with emphasis on infant child abuse awareness, through their hospital or birth center.
The new Senate bill number is S 667 - the text should be available online at thomas.loc.gov by early next week. Please stay tuned for action steps and updates.
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EBAH Highlights:
- EBAH would authorize $500 million over three years to help states expand and enhance quality home visiting programs serving parents of newborns and young children.
- The majority of funds $400 million would go directly to states as a formula grant based on the number of children ages zero to five living in the state.
- States would use EBAH dollars to build upon existing models of home visiting to ensure that families with young children receive the most appropriate services to meet their particular needs.
- The remaining $100 million would be divided between two competitive grants intended to enable home visiting programs to better reach military families and families with English language learners.
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UNICEF Report Highlights Need For U.S. To Make Better Choices for Our Children
A study released by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) last week ranked the United States second to last in child wellbeing, out of the world’s twenty-one wealthiest nations. The report clearly highlights the need to reconsider the choices this country makes politically, economically and socially when it comes to communities, families, and child well-being. "Reports like this should lead us all to ask ourselves what kind of society we want to live in,” said PCA America President and CEO Jim Hmurovich in a press release responding to the UNICEF report. “We clearly need to turn our priorities and choices toward more comprehensive and effective ways for communities and systems to care for children and families."
The UNICEF study reinforces countless reports and government data showing that child neglect and maltreatment is a significant but preventable public health problem in our country today. Many critics of the study have cited the fact that the high-scoring countries are not free-market democracies or are countries with gigantic publicly-funded social welfare infrastructures. Prevent Child Abuse America believes the United States has a unique opportunity to demonstrate how a free market-based democracy can benefit from a robust but efficient commitment to its children. “Not only is it our moral obligation, but there is also an enormous economic consequence to insufficiently addressing the needs of our children,” added Hmurovich. “Parents and advocates should not be the only ones concerned about what this report says; businesses, communities and the public at large should take notice for the future of our country both socially and economically.”
More information on the report is available at the UNICEF website. 
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