Congress and President Biden have officially passed the Supporting America’s Children and Families Act (HR 9076), which reauthorizes Title IV-B of the Social Security Act for five years. This boosts funding for the program and modernizes it – for the first time since 2008 – through policy shifts and improvements (Children’s League). Here, we’ll dig into the policies and practices Title IV-B’s reauthorization will impact. 

Poverty Prevention 

Title IV-B funds can now be spent on concrete supports including housing, transportation and nutrition assistance. It clarifies in federal law that poverty is not neglect by emphasizing the importance of family preservation services and ensuring that children aren’t separated from their parents solely because of poverty-related circumstances. This focus on poverty prevention aligns with MCC’s belief that poverty does not equal neglect.

Lived Experience

The Department of Health and Human Services periodically reviews states’ child welfare plans. The new IV-B reauthorization requires states to seek input from two new groups: youth and young adults with lived experience and caregivers, including birth parents, kinship caregivers, foster parents and adoptive parents. We at MCC believe that listening to the perspectives of those impacted by the child welfare system is essential to developing impactful policies. 

Peer Mentoring

Title IV-B defines “family preservation services” in terms of possible ways to use funding. This reauthorization adds peer-to-peer mentoring led by lived experience experts to the list of accepted family preservation services. Peer mentoring has proven an effective way to support parents navigating the child welfare system.

Supporting Caseworkers

Recruiting and maintaining caseworkers is an ongoing issue for MCC members and other nonprofits and organizations. Title IV-B now includes $26 million per year to improve the experiences of child welfare caseworkers. These funds can be used to lower caseloads, lessen administrative burdens, and promote caseworker safety, recruitment and wellness. 

Incarcerated Parents

This legislation provides up to $34 million for grants to support meaningful relationships between children in foster care and their incarcerated parents. These funds can be used for “enhanced visitation,” training for child welfare and correctional staff, and changes to policy that will aid in building family connections. 

Regulating Residential Care

The package adds a provision requiring DHHS to develop guidance on well-being and alleged maltreatment data collection in residential care to promote best practices for oversight of these programs. MCC plans to monitor this provision’s progress to see how it will be rolled out in Missouri. 

Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA)

Tribal support will increase under IV-B by allocating more IV-B funding for tribes, reducing barriers to tribal participation in IV-B, and supporting states’ implementation of the Indian Child Welfare Act. 

Blog written by Charlotte Renner