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CWLA Action Center
The new Congress in Washington is showing more commitment and concern for the problems that face our nation's children today. Action is necessry on the following issues. Write to your members of Congress and urge them to take these important steps and make children a national priority!
To read more about any of the following issues, please see CWLA's Legislative Agenda and Hot Topics.
Write an op-ed!
See tips and sample op-ed’s below.
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Support a White House Conference on Children in 2010!
CWLA calls on the new President to convene a White House Conference on Child Welfare in 2010. No such conference has been held since 1970. Three decades have passed without the White House bringing the focus of the nation to examine the state of our children. CWLA is calling on the next President to once again use the power of the White House to organize a national conference on the welfare of our children and establish national goals for improvement in the subsequent 10 years.
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Title IV-E Eligibility
Today, less than half of the children placed in foster care are eligible for federal support, and the percentage of covered children is decreasing with each passing year. Eligibility is tied to a flawed standard based on a program that was eliminated 10 years ago. The same outdated eligibility also restricts adoption assistance for families who adopt children from the child welfare system.
The President's proposed budget for FY 2008 calls for the optional child welfare block grant of Title IV-E foster care and adoption assistance, locking-in the reduced support and ending guaranteed assistance for children who qualify.
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Kinship Care
Although the federal policy recognizes placement with a relative or a legal guardian as a permanency option for children in foster care, the government makes no funds available on a continuing basis to help those relatives care for the children. Legislation in the Senate and House of Representatives would address this problem.
Contact your Members of Congress today to encourage them to cosponsor the bills and to provide federal funding to support guardianship placements.
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SCHIP and Medicaid
Although the President's budget includes a reauthorization of the State Children's Health Insurance (SCHIP), he proposes funding for that would actually result in fewer children being covered over the next five years. There are also repeated federal efforts to cut Medicaid, posing a significant threat to the child welfare system's capacity to meet the health care needs of children in foster care
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Social Services Block Grant (SSBG)
The President's proposed budget for FY 2008 calls for a cut of $500 million to SSBG, taking it from $1.7 billion to $1.2 billion. Child care, home-based services, employment services, case management services, prevention and intervention programs, special services for people with disabilities, as well as vital child welfare programs will all be hurt by such a dramatic cut.
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Juvenile Justice
After overall funding cuts of 40% over the past five years, the Administration is now proposing to eliminate what remains of the federal commitment to a focused, dedicated system of federal funding with an office to oversee, evaluate, and monitor juvenile justice throughout the country.
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