First of all, since we follow the money, we want to know where it ends in this plan. The total proposed funding the FY13-14 plan is just over $7 million more than the previous year. And although allocations for the FY13 budget at the federal level are yet to be finalized, it appears as though CCDBG could remain relatively unharmed with sequestration cuts offset by a budget proposal that would increase overall funding. However, as this has yet to be finalized, we will cross our fingers that cuts to this figure do not come to bear. The legislature has passed funding levels for the use of CCDBG funds that would slightly increase the funds designated to TANF families and slightly reduce the amount for fee-based families. The total funding proposed to support quality initiatives, including licensing inspectors, is $800,000 over FY12-13 yet represents less than 10% of the total budgeted amount.

We wanted to share a few highlights of what is included in the CCDF plan in terms of policy direction and guidance.

1. The plan highlights the success of partnerships around quality improvement initiatives such as the partnership with VECF to implement the VA STAR Quality Initiative and the partnership with Child Development Resources to implement the Infant and Toddler Specialist Network. These public-private partnerships have grown over the last few years and continue to be a useful approach for delivering professional development activities. In Virginia, 304 classrooms have current STAR ratings and 59 family homes have been rated. In 2012, 10,661 early care professionals attended training, events or received coaching through the Infant and Toddler Specialist Network.

2. The plan outlines a new co-payment scale for families receiving fee-based assistance. The scale would create a progressive co-payment plan that allows the lowest income families, those at the poverty level, to pay just 6% of their income as a co-payment. Currently all families pay 10% of their income as a co-pay regardless of income. This change would allow all families up to 160% of poverty to pay less than the 10% co-pay they currently contribute. This is an encouraging change prompting equity and will hopefully encourage more families to participate.

We also found some omissions in the plan that could be incorporated to strengthen our overall picture of this system.

1. VDSS has released an RFP that would take the Virginia Star Quality Improvement system statewide by creating 8 regional hubs to ensure linkages to state raters, coaches and technical assistance. The expansion of this network beyond the 75 localities where it is currently available will create a statewide framework for our existing pilot and provide access to this system. We hope that VDSS will consider this new framework and include some additional detail in Sections 3.3 to further development of this statewide network for the QRIS. Additionally, there are emerging plans for a regional network of professional development coordinators for early childhood educators and those in related fields that could enhance the quality improvement services offered through the QRIS hubs and through DSS and the web-based curriculum. We hope that future plans will detail how these regional hubs can be leveraged to partner with other training organizations and enhance the professional development opportunities for providers.

2. This coming year represents the first full year that the VaCMS data and payment system has been in place. During the mid-point of this current year (December 2012), as savings were identified from the implementation of the VaCMS, additional funds were identified to increase the reimbursement rates for some providers of preschool and school age children. In the future, it would be helpful to identify possible uses of any potential savings before the mid-year point, such as during the CCDF planning process, so that providers, local agencies and others may start to think ahead to the implementation and use of those funds should savings be identified.

3. A goal is stated to revisit the Licensing Standards for child care centers, yet procedural changes this year have prompted many questions about the standards of family home providers. We have concerns that with the number of children providers can serve without a license and the requirements to meet zoning ordinances, family home providers will not seek to renew their license or be unlicensed and not required to undergo any safety training or inspections. We encourage the department to revisit the family home standards as well.

4. Finally, we know that this past year has been a challenging year for the department, providers and parents as the VaCMS system has come into place. As we can hopefully say the difficult work is complete, it would be great to look at the opportunities in the future to better serve families because of this enhancement. I hope that through the CCDF plan comment process, we will hear from some families who participate and how the program has impacted their lives. Voices, as an advocate for families and children, sees several potential opportunities to use enhancements to benefit families. The first would be to change the eligibility policy to allow families who happen to lose their job to maintain eligibility for a short time while they are looking for work. This helps the child maintain the continuity of care. The second would be to identify savings or funds to move as many children off the waiting lists as possible. A waiting list of over 15,000 eligible children is far too many looking from quality care.

We hope that you will take the opportunity to comment on the CCDF plan and share these proposals with families receiving child care assistance or on the waiting list to receive care.

Please feel free to contact Emily Griffey at Emily@vakids.org or (804) 649-0184 ext. 34 if you have any questions about the plan.

(image via The Washington Post)

 Budget Items Related to Early Care and Education

- Voices’ Priorities- We were pleased that funding was provided for our highest priority issues- home visiting and early intervention (Part C) services. The budget conferees negotiated to come closer to the Senate’s position on both items. The conferees restored over $1 million to home visiting ($600,000 to CHIP of Virginia/Parents as Teachers and $550,000 to Healthy Families). We were also pleased to see the conferees improve on the Governor’s funding for early intervention by adding an additional $3 million to provide $6 million next year and come much closer to closing the shortfall.

- $500,000 of the $750,000 previously cut from the Virginia Early Childhood Foundation was also restored. This will allow VECF to continue to fund regional Smart Beginnings Coalitions and to serve as an incubator to pilot new ideas within the early childhood field.  One example of how VECF plans to pilot new ideas is their work on a kindergarten readiness assessment. VECF has formed an advisory Technical Team and selected a kindergarten readiness assessment tool to pilot.  Teachers will be trained to use the assessment tool this spring.  
Legislators also restored the remaining $250,000 previously cut from VECF’s budget, but awarded it to a new early childhood entity from the South Hampton Roads area, Elevate Early Education (E3). These funds are also to be used to pilot a kindergarten readiness assessment. With new attention being paid to kindergarten readiness assessments, we hope there will be opportunities for early childhood advocates to weigh in on their development and the approaches that will best fit our early childhood system. Voices will be following this issue and pushing for both readiness assessment pilots to include relevant stakeholder input.          

- Also related to investment in early childhood in the long term, the Department of Education received some additional funding to help implement the Virginia Longitudinal Data System that can link data from preschool to college and the workforce to better track investments in education.

 Bills Related to Early Childhood

Most of the bills introduced this session around early care and education were focused on tying up loose ends and bringing regulations in line with practice. The bill most likely to impact the early childhood community is the approval of Sen. Hanger/Del. O’Bannon’ bill that clarifies the need to provide at least one credit reference/letter of credit when applying for a child care license. Other notable bills that passed and will be sent to the Governor’s desk include a bill that would not allow the Board of Social Services to create a regulation banning a child care from hiring private armed security and a bill that allows the Department of Social Services to access background check information. An attempt to clarify language around family day home zoning was laid on the table, but may resurface again.

Older Youth in Care:

SB 863 (Sen. Favola)/HB 1743 (Del. Brink): 

This year, Voices asked patrons in both the House and Senate to introduce a bill (the versions are identical) that would permit former foster youth who become involved in the juvenile justice system to access Independent Living services even if they are released from that commitment between the ages of 18-21. We are happy to report that both the House and Senate put funding in their budgets (for both the Comprehensive Services Act and Dept. of Social Services) and unanimously passed this bill, which now awaits the Governor’s signature.

Status: Passed unanimously out of the legislature, funding included in the budget, Governor has signed the bill. This law will go into effect July 1, 2013.

SB 862 (Sen. Favola)/HB 1743 (Del. Brink):

We also asked our patrons to re-introduce a bill we worked on last session, as well, which would expand the timeframe youth aging out of foster care have to opt-in to Independent Living services from 60 days to 180 days. Both chambers passed the bill unanimously on the policy it sought to achieve, but unfortunately, with scarce resources, the Senate and House money committees found the price tag on this effort to be too steep to include in their final compromise budget.

The final budget, however, did include specific language directing the Department of Social Services to ensure youth aging out of care are adequately counseled on the services available to them before they decide not to opt-in to Independent Living.

Status: Bill passed both houses, but stalled in House Appropriations, language included in budget directing VDSS to ensure proper counseling of youth aging out of care.

SJ 282 (Sen. Favola):

Voices also successfully championed a Senate Joint Resolution that keeps momentum going on our multi-year effort to help Virginia bring more funding to our foster care and adoption system through the federal Fostering Connections Act. This resolution asks that the Virginia Department of Social Services develop implementation plans for the expansion of foster care and adoption subsidies and supports to youth ages 18-21, which would be funded primarily through federal funding streams and provide our young adults in these systems with critical transitional supports and services.

VDSS has already completed a fiscal feasibility study of extending foster care/adoption services to age 21 in 2012, also as a result of a bill championed by Voices (though the 2012 bill failed, the Senate committee sent a letter to VDSS asking that the fiscal study be completed). Voices plans to continue our work on this effort throughout 2013 and into the 2014 legislative session.

Status: Passed both House and Senate on very strong votes.

Educational Stability for Youth in Kinship Care:

SB 960 (Sen. Barker): 

Voices continues to push Virginia to break down educational barriers for children living in kinship care situations, so that relative caregivers can enroll these kids in school without forcing families into unnecessary custody proceedings in court. The bill passed the Senate unanimously, and passed the House on a very strong vote (83-12). We are hopeful the Governor will sign this bill, and you may be hearing from us on opportunities for you all to encourage him to do so, as well.

Status: Passed Senate unanimously, passed House on a very strong vote (86-12). Governor has proposed two small amendments that Voices does not oppose. The bill will be heard during the veto session, but without opposition to the amendments, we expect the Governor’s signature to follow.

Adoption Funding:

Voices was very pleased that Governor McDonnell included in his initial budget this year new funding aimed at increasing public adoptions in Virginia. Currently, Virginia ranks 49th of 50 states in finding permanency for children in foster care (permanency goals include only returning home to parents, transferring custody to relatives or adoption). The Governor included $2 million in the budget sent to the legislature, split between $1 million for $1000-per-adoption subsidies to families who adopt children out of care, and $1 million for new initiatives aimed at increasing adoptions and providing critical post-adoption services to ensure stability.

Ultimately, as the Senate and House considered their overall budgets, each chamber removed the $1 million reserved for the $1000-per-adoption subsidies. Conferees for the Senate and House then reached a compromise on the remaining $1 million (which the Senate kept in its budget but the House largely removed), reducing that budget item to a final amount of $500,000 for adoption recruitment and post-adoption services.

Status: Senate and House passed the budget bill, which included the $500,000 funding for adoption incentives and post-adoption services, awaiting possible further action by the Governor.

For questions/feedback on these items, please contact Voices’ Senior Policy Attorney Amy Woolard at amy@vakids.org.

This past Saturday was a busy day in Richmond with both the House and Senate tying up all of the loose ends of the 2013 Session and wanting to adjourn on time. Not to get lost in all of the last minute shuffling, we want to acknowledge and celebrate the many good things included in the budget conference report reflecting Voices’ priority issues. As advocates, you all played a tremendous role in these successes. The conference budget, now approved by the General Assembly, goes to the Governor.

Early Care & Education

• The conference budget restores over $1 million in cuts to home visiting programs, CHIP (Item 297 #2c) and Healthy Families (Item 343 #1c). CHIP of Virginia/Parents as Teachers ended up with $600,000 restored and Healthy Families with $550,000. These funds are critical to ensure statewide access to these evidence-based family strengthening and health care improvement programs.
• Your tremendous outpouring of support for early intervention (Part C) services for babies and toddlers helped to secure $2.3 million in funding in the current fiscal year and $6 million to meet the shortfall next fiscal year. We are very thankful that the conferees agreed to support the Senate’s request of an additional $3 million on top of the Governor’s proposal of $3 million. Although there will still be a small shortfall, the additional funding will put programs in a much better position for next year. Item 315 #1c

Children’s Mental Health

• The conference budget included an additional $1.9 million in FY14 for children’s crisis response services and child psychiatry (Item 315 #4c). This total includes the $1 million added by the Governor and the $900,000 approved by the General Assembly. This amount is in addition to the $1.75 million included in the FY14 budget during the 2012 session that will continue to be awarded to the three regions currently funded, bringing the statewide total to $3.65 million.
• The conference budget also includes funding for two training and awareness programs recommended by the Governor’s School Safety Task Force:
  •  Mental Health First Aid received $600,000 in FY14 (Item 315 #2c). Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) is a 12-hour interactive course that teaches the risk factors and warning signs and symptoms of mental health disorders to clergy, teachers, health professionals, and others.
  • Suicide prevention efforts received $500,000 in FY14 (Item 314 #3c). Funds will go to DBHDS to collaborate with several other state agencies for a comprehensive suicide prevention plan.

Foster Care/Child Welfare

• The conference budget provided funding to implement Voices’ bills on independent living, House Bill 1743/Senate Bill 863. These bills allow youth coming out of the Department of Juvenile Justice between ages 18-21 who were former foster youth to get assistance in independent living skills.  The funding is combined from CSA funds of $97,614 (Item 283 #1c) and DSS funds of $19,945 (Item 338 #1c) in FY14.

Medicaid Extension

• After lots of last minute twists and turns, Virginia now has a path forward to extend Medicaid to the 400,000 low-income Virginians who would be eligible for Medicaid coverage under the Affordable Care Act. The conference budget includes language allowing Virginia to move forward if DMAS adopts certain reforms, and gains federal approval of other reforms (Item 307 #20c). The budget creates a new commission, the Medicaid Innovation and Reform Commission, with the authority to determine whether enough reform has been done to start the eligibility expansion. The House has named its members to the Commission: Dels. R. Steven Landes, R-Augusta, Jimmie Massie, R-Henrico, John M. O’Bannon III, R-Henrico, Johnny S. Joannou, D-Portsmouth, and Beverly J. Sherwood, R-Frederick. The Senate has not yet named its members.

What are discretionary programs and why does this only impact discretionary programs? You may have heard a lot about how the defense industry will be impacted by sequestration because defense contracts and materials are in the discretionary budget. Many programs impacting children and families are also in the discretionary budget, most notably Head Start, child care assistance, and special education. The current proposal would not impact mandatory programs such as Medicaid/FAMIS and SNAP (food stamps).

Will these cuts take effect immediately if sequestration goes into effect? Although it will be a very tenuous time for all programs that could be impacted by sequestration, we must be cautious and deter programs from implementing these cuts immediately as there may be additional budget negotiations before these cuts get passed down to programs.

Estimates point to as many 1000 preschoolers in Virginia would no longer have access to Head Start, over 300 jobs for Virginia special educators could be impacted and Virginia could lose nearly $1 million in Maternal and Child Health Block Grant funds. You can read more about how sequestration could potentially impact Virginia’s program’s for children and families here: Impact of sequestration on VA.

Daily Press: Thousands of children will be dropped from Head Start

NEW- There are revised estimates of what the impact on Virginia could be given the delay in implementation of sequestration to March 1st. This estimate from our partners at First Focus provides an overview of how Virginia could be impacted if sequestration goes into effect on March 1st. 2013 Sequestration Impact on Kids – Virginia

The White House has also produced estimates of the impact in Virginia using a slightly smaller estimate of the across the board cuts at 5%.

Of particular interest to children’s advocates, these estimates include how many children in Virginia could be impacted if the across the board cuts take effect.

- 400 -740 families could loose access to child care assistance

- Around 1,000 preschoolers could be cut from Head Start

- Schools, and students with disabilities in particular, could be impacted by cuts close to $28 million statewide

- 3,500 children could loose access to vaccines

- Close to 11,000 pregant women and infants could loose nurtition assistance through WIC

You Can Take Action To Avoid the Slide In to Sequestration

We also hope that you will take a moment to thank the 9 members of the Virginia delegation who have taken a united stand in opposition to sequestration. Those members are: Senators Warner and Kaine and Representatives Connelly, Forbes, Moran, Rigell, Scott, Wittman, and Wolf.

Please write to the four members of Congress who have not yet agreed to stand in the way of across the board cuts. They are Cantor, Goodlatte, Griffith and Hurt.

Each domain contains reliable data on a set of indicators, many of which can be compared to national data. This permits us to monitor trends in child well-being over time and also to compare Virginia children to their counterparts nationally. We compare current data to the same data from 2006 or in some cases even earlier. The latest data available on many indicators is from 2011, which gives us at least a five-year span in which to evaluate progress or decline.

As adults, they are more likely to have dropped out of school, have chronic health problems, experience periods of unemployment, make lower wages, be single parents, or have criminal justice involvement. The harmful effects of child poverty are cumulative: the longer the stay in poverty, the greater the risk of negative outcomes.

Read this new report for the latest information about Virginia’s children.

It is particularly important that you contact the conferees IF YOU ARE A CONSTITUENT! That is who they listen to most. But at this point in the process, all Virginia citizens may contact the conferees to express their opinions.

The MESSAGE:

 You may use our email system to send a message—please personalize, and especially note if you are a constituent. Or you may call or email them directly with the contact info listed below. Here’s what we want to say:

-        Thank you for providing additional mental health funding. We appreciate that both the House and Senate funded children’s mental health services; please include the full $1 million that the Senate included. We are also grateful that the House included funding for suicide prevention efforts and mental health first aid, and we support those initiatives as well.

-        Please support the Senate’s position on Early Intervention/Part C services for infants and toddlers: it would provide $6 million to fill an $8.5 million shortfall for FY14. Each million dollars lost means that 250 babies and toddlers with disabilities will not be able to get services.

-        Thank you for restoring funds to the evidence-based home visiting programs Healthy Families and CHIP of Virginia. Please support the Senate’s position that restores more of the funding the programs lost during the recession.

THE BUDGET CONFEREES ARE:

HOUSE:

Delegate Lacey Putney, DelLPutney@house.virginia.gov   , 698-1019

Del. Beverly Sherwood,   DelBSherwood@house.virginia.gov, 698-1029

Delegate Kirk Cox, DelKCox@house.virginia.gov   , 698-1066

Delegate Steven Landes  , DelSLandes@house.virginia.gov, 698-1025

Delegate Chris Jones, DelCJones@house.virginia.gov, 698-1076

Delegate Johnny Joannou, DelJJoannou@house.virginia.gov, 698-1079

SENATE:

Senator Charles Colgan , district29@senate.virginia.gov , 698-7529

Senator Walter Stosch , district12@senate.virginia.gov , 698-7512

Senator Thomas Norment,  district03@senate.virginia.gov , 698-7503

Senator Janet Howell, district32@senate.virginia.gov , 698-7532

Senator Emmett Hanger , district24@senate.virginia.gov , 698-7524

Senator John Watkins , district10@senate.virginia.gov , 698-7510

Thank you for speaking up on behalf of children!

The president’s proposal seeks to expand access to preschool for low- to moderate- income four year old children (those in families up to 200% poverty- $38,180 gross yearly income for a family of three).

• Virginia currently provides opportunities for preschool to low to moderate income four year olds through the Virginia Preschool Initiative (VPI). This initiative has been in place since 1996 and has steadily grown to serve over 17,000 four year olds statewide.
• Only 6 out of 10 disadvantaged four year olds have access to high quality preschool in Virginia. The proposed state and federal preschool partnership could expand access to 14,558 low income four year olds statewide.
• VA: Total four year olds below 200% poverty= 39,686
• VA: Four year olds enrolled in Head Start and VPI= 25,128
• VA: Four years old poised to benefit from additional access to preschool= 14,558; 37% of low to moderate income four year olds

The proposal would require Virginia to meet quality benchmarks linked to better outcomes for children. Virginia is poised to expand access to preschool and improve quality in both public and private early care settings by participating in the STAR Quality Rating and Improvement System and aligning teacher background requirements in public schools, private child care and Head Start.

• Virginia already does a fairly good job of meeting quality benchmarks in its VPI programs, meeting seven out of 10 quality benchmarks according to the National Institute for Early Education Research.
• Proposals currently under consideration by the legislature to pilot a kindergarten readiness assessment and to launch a longitudinal data system for education could help Virginia better evaluate its current investment in pre-k.

This proposal helps to build on the early care system by continuing to invest in Head Start. Currently, over 15,900 children are enrolled in Early Head Start and Head Start statewide- 2,700 infants and toddlers in Early Head Start and 13,200 preschoolers in Head Start.

The component of the president’s plan to launch a new Early Head Start-Child Care Partnership program is critically important to Virginia. Ensuring high quality, comprehensive services to all at-risk children birth through five is critical to promote school readiness. Virginia is poised to benefit from additional opportunities to expand high quality early care in other care settings than preschool by taking advantage of our STAR Quality Rating System, Infant and Toddler Specialist training network and our infant mental health initiatives.

Additional expansion of evidence-based home visiting will build on Virginia’s existing network of evidence- based home visiting and could expand access to home visitors and mentors to connect low-income families to community resources and educational support.

*image via The Heckman Equation at https://www.facebook.com/heckmanequation

For more information on early care and education please contact Emily at emily@vakids.org or (804) 649-0184 ext. 34.

Children’s Mental Health

Expanding Crisis Services and Child Psychiatry

Voices’ Campaign for Children’s Mental Health requested $450,000 in additional funding for FY14 for children’s crisis services and child psychiatry, in addition to the Governor’s $1 million amendment for this purpose.

-  The House approved this amendment in full. Item 315 #2h

-  The Senate approved this amendment in full and added more funding for a total of $1 million. Adding funding for children’s mental health services is a recommendation of the Governor’s School Safety Task Force. Item 315 #2s

Improving the Quality of Medicaid-funded Children’s Mental Health Services

The Senate included a language amendment to require the state Medicaid agency (DMAS) and the state mental health agency (DBHDS) to review intensive in-home services, therapeutic day treatment and mental health support services, including considering practice models, reimbursement rates, and the need for a less intensive level of services. Voices requested this amendment. Item 307 #17s

For a full list of mental health budget amendments, click here.

Early Childhood

Home Visiting

The House and Senate budgets both included funding for home visiting programs, CHIP and Healthy Families. We prefer the Senate proposals that recognized the need to bring funding for home visiting back to the pre-recession levels of investment.

-   The House provides $190,000 for Healthy Families and $410,000 for CHIP of Virginia from the TANF block grant (federal funds). CHIP-Item 297 #2h HF- Item 343 #2h

-   The Senate provides $1 M for Healthy Families ($700,000 in GF and $300,000 in TANF) and $727,628 for CHIP of Virginia ($427,628 in GF and $300,000 in TANF). CHIP- Item 297 #2s HF- Item 343 #2s

Part C/Early Intervention

In addition to the funding proposed in the Governor’s budget, the House and Senate both add funding for Part C/Early Intervention. We prefer the Senate proposal that would restore $6 M of the $8.5 M shortfall for services.

-   The House proposal for Part C/Early Intervention includes $2.3 M in FY13 and $3.75 M in FY14. Item 315 #1h

-   The Senate proposal for Part C/Early Intervention gets closer to closing the shortfall at $3M in FY13 and $6M in FY14. Item 315 #3s

Child Welfare/Foster Care

Provide re-entry supports to foster youth involved in the juvenile justice system

Both the Senate and the House included nearly $120,000 in their respective budgets to fund the Voices-led effort to provide eligibility for Independent Living services to former foster youth being released from the Department of Juvenile Justice between the ages of 18-21, which include educational, employment and housing supports. Voices brought the bills and budget amendments to the patrons.

Budget Amendments: Senate (Favola, Item 338 #2s), House (Brink, Item 341 #2h)

Corresponding bills: Senate (Favola, SB863), House (Brink, HB1743)

Medicaid Extension

Extend Medicaid coverage for individuals up to 133% of the federal poverty level under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

The House and Senate differed on their approaches to extending Medicaid. The House budget (Item 307 #11h) requires a long list of reforms be completed before extending Medicaid and does not allow extension until July 1, 2014 at the earliest. It would likely take much longer to complete the extensive list of reforms, so in essence, this version delays extension indefinitely. The Senate budget (Item 307 #18s) was amended during debate on the Senate floor yesterday to allow Medicaid extension to take place once Virginia has gotten approval for reforms from the federal government, meaning extension can happen much sooner. The Senate budget also establishes a special trust fund to capture savings from the various reforms and from the extension itself to cover future costs.

You can read more about what happened this week with Medicaid extension here.