Importance: Whether people come to us for simple, short-term assistance or with more complex, long-term needs, we must be present to the whole person, offering the right benefits at the right time. Our participation in the Governor’s Poverty Reduction Workgroup and our own efforts to work with families to understand the cycle of intergenerational poverty will give us the tools we need to help individuals and families achieve economic stability.
Based on this, DSHS has established the following strategic objectives to support how we will provide a pathway out of poverty and becoming healthier.
REDUCE POVERTY
Provide assistance to the Governor’s Poverty Reduction workgroup.
Importance: DSHS and its approach to government-to-government collaboration with tribes and Recognized American Indian Organizations are recognized for knowledge of tribal governments and communities. The workgroup is charged with developing a strategic plan to reduce poverty, improve communities and make needed progress related to housing, health integration, employment and education systems.
Success Measure: Increase tribal participation to 100 percent, involving all 29 tribes and seven Recognized American Indian Organization’s (RAIOs) in the plan development, by June 2019.
Action Plan: Assist with collaboration and communication activities between the Office of Indian Policy, tribes, agencies and others including:
- Connect Department and other partners to tribal leadership, professionals, and communities around efforts to gather information and involve tribes in the initiative.
- Facilitate meetings to involve tribes and communities as information-gathering efforts take place.
- Provide assistance to the workgroup and tribes as meetings are scheduled to share the vision of the Poverty Reduction Workgroup project and collaborate with tribes and tribal communities to gather information and feedback.
- Help implement the workgroup’s plan once it is developed.
Reduce poverty in the disability community in coordination with DSHS and workforce development partners.
Importance: Poverty affects the disability community at rates nearly double that of individuals without disabilities. While individuals with disabilities represent approximately 13 percent of the overall Washington working age population, they make up 26 percent of those living in poverty. DVR customers who obtain employment improve their economic circumstances and are less reliant on public benefits. However, only about 18 percent of DVR participants who are employed have incomes that equal or exceed 200 percent of the federal poverty level.
DVR provides access to services that support labor force participation and higher education and demand-driven job training that result in higher wages and financial independence. DVR also supports policy reforms to address barriers to economic success for Washingtonians with disabilities. These initiatives are carried out in collaboration with DSHS’ Economic Services Administration, WorkSource and workforce training programs, and community partners and advocates.
Success Measure: Increase the percentage of DVR participants who exit DVR services with incomes at or above 200 percent of federal poverty level from 18 percent to 25 percent by June 2020.
Action Plan:
- Educate customers about well-paying career options and encourage participation in educational and workforce training programs that prepare job-seekers for careers that pay a living wage.
- Increase coordination and collaboration with DSHS, workforce development and community partners to develop integrated service delivery models, to expand access to services and to support customers’ need for job success.
- Promote strategies to mitigate the potential loss of essential benefits and services to ensure that advancement in employment leads to upward financial mobility for people with disabilities.
Increase program exits to self-sufficiency
Importance: Increased exits from public assistance require employment in stable jobs with opportunities for increased wage progression.
Success Measure: Increase the percentage of people who leave Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) due to increased income or at their request from 58 percent in March 2018 to 60 percent by June 2021.
Action Plan:
- Simplify and develop a “one program” concept to ensure seamless transitions for all customers from program to program (WorkFirst, Basic Food, Employment and Training, Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act, colleges, etc.).
- Develop a proposal for a refugee/immigrant pathway out of poverty pilot, including seeking additional resources.
- Explore making more resources available to families by adding children to the Social Security Income facilitation group we serve.
- Explore and develop data-gathering methods to ensure accurate measures of successful exits from public assistance.
- Implement final, approved recommendations from Transforming Case Management, a multi-year project that will fundamentally change the way we work with customers; which includes expanding case management services, serving the whole family, strengthening our community partnerships and referrals to other resources, and coaching and evaluation strategies.
Prepare clients for reentry into the community.
Decision Package: 135 - PL- M4 - Wraparound Reentry
Importance: Governor Inslee’s Executive Order on Reentry requires reentry plans for all clients leaving a juvenile rehabilitation facility. Supporting a successful reentry in clear and direct ways makes the difference between recidivism and successful transition to the community. Planning ahead of time for post-release helps address the many pervasive obstacles faced by clients with employment, education, housing, and social services and improves their long-term outcomes significantly.
Success Measure: Increase the number of clients released from juvenile rehabilitation who have stable housing within six months of release from 83 percent in 2015 to 90 percent by June 2019. Note: Data from a DSHS Research and Data Analysis report on Housing Status of Youth Exiting Foster Care, Behavioral Health and Criminal Justice Systems provided yearly.
See Chart JX20: Juvenile Rehabilitation (JR) Clients Released into Stable Housing
Action Plan:
- Hold Reentry Team meetings upon intake to prepare clients and families for release.The meetings will address issues and risk factors that lead to housing instability.
- Engage clients and families in actively planning for housing before release and document resources in service plan.
- Connect clients and families with community resources and supports for housing upon release.
Seek external resources to expand capacity to evaluate poverty-related policies and intervention strategies.
Importance: Achieving this objective is aligned with the Governor’s initiative to reduce poverty, improve communities and make needed progress related to housing, health integration, employment and education. The recently established Governor’s Poverty Reduction Workgroup is co-led by the departments of Social and Health Services, Commerce and Employment Security.
Success Measure:
- Obtain public or private resources to fund new poverty-focused, cross-agency data integration efforts by June 2020.
- Complete in fiscal year 2021, funded poverty-focused policy analyses prioritized in collaboration with external agency partners to support initiatives to reduce poverty and/or mitigate the effects of poverty in Washington.
Action Plan:
- Identify staff responsible to seek and obtain public or private resources to support new poverty-focused, cross-agency data integration efforts.
- With external public and private resources, enhance DSHS’ integrated client data environment with new and/or expanded data sources to support poverty-focused policy analysis.
- Collaborate with Economic Services Administration (ESA), other DSHS program partners and external agency partners to identify and conduct high-priority analyses to support initiatives to reduce poverty and/or mitigate the effects of poverty in Washington.
SUPPORT TRANSITIONS TO THE WORKFORCE AND IMPROVE EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES FOR DISABLED INDIVIDUALS
Ensure successful transitions into the workforce for students with disabilities.
Importance: Students with disabilities often leave school without a path to further education or employment. Criteria for services change when youth reach adulthood and many support services are no longer available once they leave high school. Youth are often unprepared to navigate the complex array of services available to adults.
Comprehensive planning and coordination of school-based and vocational services help students acquire the knowledge, skills and supports they need to achieve their vocational goals and live as independently as possible after high school. The Division of Vocational Rehabilitation (DVR) collaborates with education and workforce development agencies to offer group services for students with disabilities so they can learn about the world of work, develop work-readiness skills and find employment. Eligible students also may receive individualized services from DVR.
Success Measure: Attain a 70 percent rate of entering post-secondary education or employment within one year of exiting secondary education for students with disabilities who are DVR customers.
Action Plan:
- Expand the scope and availability of pre-employment transition services through new and extended contracts with Washington’s community rehabilitation programs, Workforce Development Councils, community and technical colleges and educational service districts. Emphasize work-based learning experiences and work-based readiness training.
- Increase collaboration and agreements with education officials, schools, and community partners to assess service needs, evaluate service delivery models and establish a seamless continuum of services for students with disabilities throughout Washington.
- Ensure DVR staff are knowledgeable of and use transition planning and practices that best support positive post-secondary outcomes for youth.
Improve employment outcomes for individuals with disabilities.
Importance: Employment contributes to a person’s ability to live independently, attain a higher quality of life and participate fully in the community. People with disabilities who want to work can face substantial barriers to finding or keeping a job.
As a core program of Washington’s workforce development system, DVR promotes a healthier, more prosperous Washington through a dual-customer model, serving both individuals with disabilities and Washington’s businesses. DVR provides individualized services to people with disabilities, with priority for individuals with the most significant disabilities. These services are customer-driven and consistent with individuals’ unique strengths, abilities, interests and informed choice. Through business engagement, DVR and its partners work to close skill gaps, strengthen and diversify the workforce, and expand opportunities for people with disabilities in Washington.
Success Measure: Increase the percent of DVR participants who achieve successful employment outcomes from 55 percent in June 2018 to 65 percent by June 2020.
Action Plan:
- Strengthen vocational assessment practices as the foundation for individualized services that meet customer needs, identify and address barriers to employment and maximize outcomes.
- Provide staff training and support to ensure that staff have the knowledge and skills needed to equitably deliver high-quality vocational rehabilitation services to customers with diverse needs, abilities and interests.
- Increase business outreach and engagement to expand employment opportunities for individuals with disabilities, in collaboration with local Workforce Development Boards.
Increase the number of working-age adults with a developmental disability who are employed.
Decision Package: 040 – ML – DN - High School Transition Students
Importance: Developmental Disabilities Administration (DDA) is committed to providing employment support to all working-aged adult clients. Having a job and earning a wage are powerful achievements. Increasing access and opportunities for employment allows individuals to fully participate in their communities.
Success Measure: Increase the percentage of working-age adults with developmental disabilities receiving supported employment services who are employed from 66.2 percent in July 2017 to 67 percent by June 2019.
Action Plan:
- Provide regional management teams and counties with quarterly data showing supported employment caseload and activities.
- Use appropriated funding to expand capacity on the Basic Plus waiver for individuals who are age 21, graduating from high school, Medicaid-eligible and interested in pursuing supported employment services.
- Seek technical assistance provided by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to evaluate “Value Based Purchasing” model. This may provide valuable information and options for financial and non-financial incentives to increase employment of clients with high-acuity needs.
INDIVIDUAL STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES
Increase cross-agency/cross-program services and supports for customers.
Decision Package: 060 – PL - Q2 – Partnership for Reemployment Backup
Importance: Economic Services Administration (ESA) can best accomplish its mission and unifying goal by developing, expanding and nurturing relationships with key state, federal, tribal and local partners that serve common customers. To the extent possible, it’s vital that we align or integrate service delivery models and services to provide the most effective supports.
Success Measure: The Solutions for Transitioning Parents[3] re-employment program is successfully implemented in King County by 2021.
Action Plan:
- Continue work to accomplish the objectives on the state’s Workforce Innovation and Opportunities Act plan to ensure integrated service delivery for our customers.
- Collaborate with the Social Security Administration to shape the future of disability claim processing by continuing to be involved in planning, designing, and implementing a new nation-wide claims processing system Disability Case Processing System (DCPS)[4] through a pilot program.
- Identify and pursue opportunities to integrate service delivery tailored to meet customer needs, either virtually through the use of innovative technology, in an ESA office location, or via out- stationing of our staff and resources.
- Identify opportunities to partner through grant pilots
- Expand Partnership for Re-Employment Project (PREP)[5] from locations in one region to locations in two regions by 2021.
- Collaborate with the Governor’s Interagency Workgroup on Poverty Reduction to develop the framework for reducing intergenerational poverty.
- Improve service alignment with the Department of Corrections for individuals leaving correctional facilities and re-entering local communities.
Increase child support collections.
Decision Packages: 060 – PL – FX – Modernize SEMS, 060 – ML – FA- Families Forward Washington Grant, 060 – PL - Q2 – Partnership for Reemployment Backup, 060 – PL – QE – Contractor Reporting, 060 – PL – FE- Child Support Annual Fee Increase
Importance: Child support represents more than 40 percent of the income for very poor families. Consistent child support payments and resources for the whole family contribute to a family’s economic stability and their ability to exit the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program due to self-sufficiency.
Success Measure:
- Increase current support collected from 66.8 percent in federal fiscal year 2017 to 70 percent by federal fiscal year 2021.
- Increase the average “percent of increase” of current support paid by Partnership for Re-Employment Project (PREP)[6] participants from 26 percent as of February 2018 to 33 percent by June of 2021.
- Increase the income and child support payments for 55 percent of Families Forward Washington (FFW)[7] participants between January 2019 and June 2021.
See Chart E1.3: Percent of current child support collected
Action Plan:
- Propose legislation to require contractor reporting of sub-contractors through the Washington State Support Registry.
- Improve IT support for prosecuting attorneys to aid in child support establishments and modifications.
- Provide opportunities to low-income non-custodial parents to increase earnings capacity, skills, and financial literacy and enable them to better support themselves and their families and result in more regular, consistent child support payments.
- Propose legislation to reduce the threshold amount of “25 percent above or below” for modification review to allow more flexibility to change child support orders[8]
[3] Solutions for Transitioning Parents (STP) program is a collaboration with Washington’s Division of Child Support (DCS) Seattle Field Office and the South Seattle College Solutions for Transitioning Parents (STP) program and various other Local Community-Based Organizations and Partners to assist previously incarcerated adults living in King County to successfully transition back into the community.
[4] The Disability Case Processing System (DCPS) is a new, nation-wide claims processing system being developed to process SSA disability cases. WA DDS is involved in the beta testing and pilot project to roll out this system.
[5] Partnership for Re-Employment Project (PREP) is a collaboration between Division of Child Support and Employment Security Department/WorkSource providing comprehensive training and employment services to parents who owe child support.
[6] Partnership for Re-Employment Project (PREP) is a collaboration between Division of Child Support and Employment Security Department/WorkSource providing comprehensive training and employment services to parents who owe child support.
[7] Families Forward Washington (FFW) is a grant project working with local service providers in Benton and Franklin counties. The program will test new strategies to improve the earnings capacity, skills and financial literacy of low-income parents who owe child support but are unable to fully meet their obligations due to low earnings.
[8] Current law provides that, in order for the Division of Child Support to file an action for modification or adjustment of an order, the child support order must be at least twenty-five percent above or below the appropriate child support amount. This can be too restrictive in some cases and does not allow the department to pursue a modification or adjustment when the change would be beneficial for the family but does not meet the 25% threshold change.