OCSE
Responsible
Fatherhood Programs
Early Implementation Lessons
[or how to switch
custody,
end child support enforcement
&
click here for DHHS original report: provide cover for
pedophiles]
Even though this evaluation of the Child Access
Demonstration Projects revealed that although the interventions had only limited success in solving access problems among extremely disputatious and highly conflicted couples,
they did assist many noncustodial parents in the
resolution of their access problems, they
continue to fund this custody switching scam. Fully 65 to 70 percent of
those who attempted to mediate reached an agreement; mediation and other access
interventions garnered high levels of user satisfaction from both custodial and
noncustodial parents.
[No doubt this is the 65 to 70 percent of abusers who win sole or joint custody
-- cited by the American Judges Association.] Despite these positive outcomes, access interventions
had only limited impact on
child support payment patterns, which tended to track with the financial
resources of the noncustodial parent rather than his access situation
(Price, et al., 1994; Pearson, et al., 1996; Pearson and Thoennes,
1997; Pearson and Thoennes, 1999).
Grants
$$$
How our money is misused
to discriminate against women and children
http://www.statejustice.org/grantinfo/chifam.htm
http://www.rwjf.org/reports/grr/029319s.htm
Jessica
Pearson, Ph.D.
Nancy Thoennes, Ph.D.
Center for
Policy Research
303/837-1555
David Price,
Ph.D.
Jane Venohr, Ph.D.
Policy
Studies Inc.
999 18th
Street Suite 900
Denver CO 80202
303/863-0900
June 2000
This report was prepared for the Office of
Child Support Enforcement, Administration for Children and Families, and
the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation of the United
States Department of Health and Human
Services,
the Department of Health and Human Services, the Multi-site Evaluation and
Synthesis of Responsible Fatherhood
Projects is supported by a grant from the Ford Foundation to the Center for
Policy Research. The findings and
conclusions in this report are those of the authors and do not necessarily
represent the official positions or policies of
the Department of Health and Human Services or its agencies nor the
views of the Ford Foundation.
Executive Summary
In late 1997, the federal Office of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE) funded
Responsible
Fatherhood Demonstration Projects in eight states. All of these programs
attempt to improve the
employment and earnings of under- and unemployed noncustodial
parents, and to motivate them to
become more financially and emotionally involved in the lives of their
children. Although the
projects share common goals, they do not follow a single format or a specific
model of service
delivery. [When they mention noncustodial,
they mean fathers --not the thousands of mothers losing
custody of their children to abusers – this is gender specific. The main
motivation is money. These programs,
designed by the father’s rights leaders, protect violent men from criminal
prosecution by giving them sole or
joint custody, as you will see in the following report.] http://fatherhood.hhs.gov/guidance01/ch6.htm
Future reports will focus on the outcomes the projects achieve with respect
to employment, earnings,
parent-child contact,
and the payment of child support. This report is an early implementation
analysis of the programs focusing on: (1) how they are administered; (2) the
types of services they
deliver; (3) the
coalitions they created with community-based organizations and state and local
service agencies; (4) how they recruit program participants; and (5) how
they monitor client progress.
Below, we summarize some of the key lessons to be learned from the early
experiences of the
projects with implementation and operation.
[When they refer to “parent-child contact,” they
are insinuating that fathers who get lots of visitation
with their children in the form of “shared parenting” or “joint custody” will
be more willing to pay their
child support. Their real agenda, is to
obliterate child support payments through court ordered custody
switching away from the primary caretaker, usually the mother, to a “joint”
situation so that neither parent
owes the other any money. Mom still gets
the brunt of expenses and Dad gets reimbursed for instigating
a custody fight. http://www.acf.dhhs.gov/news/cswaivers.htm
The coalitions they build refer to attorney/evaluator
associations in the form of an array of expensive programs:
guardian ad ltem, Cooperative Parenting, Collaborative Law, Alternative Dispute Resolution, mediation, reunification
and threat therapy, which are paid by the parties into the court
administrator’s account and funded through government
programs.] http://www.collabgroup.com/group.htm
Questions Raised About Court-Appointed Psychologist
Reporter:
Valeri Williams | WFFA.com
Updated:
Pasadena
Star News, Judges Comeback Assailed, Watchdog group says Gold's lucrative work deal, conduct in
cases improper,
And John Clark of
Lesson 1: It
is important for architects of programs seeking to increase income
and stimulate responsible fatherhood to serve a broad group of participants,
be flexible
about program design and recruitment, and generate services that match the
needs
of participants.
No matter how extensive the planning process is, there are always elements
of surprise in
implementing a responsible fatherhood program. Targeted populations fail to
materialize; others
appear. Services that are popular at some sites and with some participants are
unappealing to others.
Programs that define the target population too narrowly or are rigid about the
mix of services that
they offer experience problems with recruitment and attendance. Program
architects should be
receptive to serving a wide range of participants, adapting services to accommodate their needs and
interests, and creating new services to fill in service gaps in the broader
community.
[“Program Architects” are the fathers rights guys responsible
for protective parents, primary caretakers, usually mothers losing custody to
abusers.
http://www.calib.com/peerta/policies/pdf/aboutgui.pdf
Their premise is,
based on their own studies, that children need a
father in their life. There are a vast
array of independent studies that refute this showing children need consistency
and financial support, that obliteration of child support and moving in and out
of homes every other week produces instability, but these program architects
prefer to ignore this.]
Lesson
2: Programs should take advantage of collaborations with other community
agencies, but must be
knowledgeable about eligibility restrictions imposed by other
programs and funding
sources.
While all eight projects have stretched their resources by collaborating
with a variety of public and
private agencies to recruit participants and provide services, they have
problems with restrictive
eligibility requirements for some funding streams like Welfare-to-Work and TANF. It is important
for programs to know the eligibility rules for various programs so that they
steer participants
appropriately, and to explore the feasibility of widening of program requirements
so that more
participants can be served.
[They have problems with programs that can’t be
easily twisted and wrenched from mothers and children. This from the National Fatherhood Initiative,
Don Eberley and Wade Horn, former President George
Bush cronies, who were hiding out during the Clinton Administration, scarfing up federal funds and proselytizing against needy
mothers and children getting welfare funds.
Now his son, President George Bush has reinstated them, in the Faith
Based Initiative and the Department of
Health and Human Services overseeing programs designed to help women and
children.]
[There Must Be Fifty ways To
Start A Family: Social Policy and the Fragile Families of Low-Income, Noncustodial Fathers, Ronald B. Mincy
and Hillard Pouncy in The
Fatherhood Movement; A Call to Action edited by Wade Horn, David Blankenhorn,
Mitch Pearlstein and Don Eberley, (Posted 10/06/1999) Technical Amendment to Welfare-toWork (WtW), Elgibility Criteria
for Noncustodial Parents, Guidance from the
Employment and Training Administration, DOL, Sept. 21, 1998, (Posted
10/06/1999)]
Lesson
3: It is important to "customize" and "personalize"
services provided to
project participants by
outside agencies to ensure that they receive adequate
attention and appropriate
treatments.
While it makes sense for projects to refer participants to existing
employment and community
services and thus avoid service duplication, participants often need more
personal attention and
assistance than is normally given to the general public. Some programs hire
staff to be present at
public employment agencies or use case managers to make sure participants do
not get lost in the
general flow of agency cases. There is a need for personalized outreach when it
comes to recruiting
and retaining program participants and cultivating potential employers.
CRC’s http://www.vix.com/crc/conf/ How to Obtain Access/Visitation Grants--David Arnaudo, administrator of the $10 million in annual federal access grants to the states, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, CRC chapter heads administering grants in IL, NY, MD, NE and D.C., and state officials, How to Present a Court Case & more--Gerald Solomon and Ron Milko, domestic relations attorneys, Maryland
Lesson
4: Programs serving low-income fathers have identified important gaps in
employment services to be
filled - apprenticeships, on-the-job training
opportunities, and jobs with
wage growth. Parents with a history of incarceration
and other barriers face
particular difficulties.
Although there are many employment programs that offer "soft"
skills training like résumé writing
and interviewing skills, the programs are generally lacking in opportunities
for paid apprenticeships
or more substantial training programs that lead to the acquisition of
marketable skills. Programs also
need to develop employment opportunities for participants with a criminal
background, limited
education, sporadic or limited work history, and other barriers. Developing
marketable skills and
employing project participants at livable wages is central to the success of
responsible fatherhood
programs.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FAMILYCOURTREFORM/message/7347
Wade Horn’s Incarcerated Fathers Initiative
& Marketing Plan
http://www.fatherhood.org/articles/pr060801.htm J Titled "Tarzan,"
the television PSA utilizes footage cut from classic 1939 Johnny Weissmuller Tarzan Finds a Son, to increase awareness of
the critical importance of fathers. Set to upbeat music, the viewer sees Tarzan
and his son, Boy, engaged in various father-son activities - Tarzan and Boy
riding an elephant, swimming through a tropical lagoon and swinging on a vine.
Pennsylvania Fatherhood
Initiative, Tom Ridge, Governor, V. P. Cheney’s next best friend, seen here with his two out
of shape kiddos touting bogus stats and federally funded ads scarfed up by Wade Horn via his National Fatherhood
Initiative during his pendency of his Senate approval
as Assistant Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. Can we say conflict of interest???
http://www.policyexperts.org/insider/2000/feb00/ofnote.html
Development Director Sought by National
Fatherhood Initiative
The National Fatherhood Initiative, a six
year old national civic organization, is looking for a Director of Development.
The candidate must have at least 5 prior years of development experience in a
comparable organization and have the proven capacity to organize a professional
fundraising department that can generate rapid financial growth. Salary negotiable. CONTACT: National Fatherhood Initiative,
Lesson
5: Programs are collaborating with child support agencies in new ways to
educate parents about the
child support program, understand their cases, and
explore their options. Staff
at the programs would like the child support system to
be even more responsive to
participants' needs and financial limitations.
All the programs have developed links with child support agencies that
enable them to help
participants understand their child support situation, remedy errors in their case records, and pursue
requests to adjust their child support orders. These are welcome
developments but may not go far
enough in addressing the limited income and other financial obligations of
program participants and
their motivational needs. Four of the programs have adopted more substantial
accommodations,
including suspending current
child support orders during job training and job search, reducing
monthly arrears payments, avoiding license suspensions and bench warrants, and reducing child
support orders to below guideline levels. Without minimizing the
financial needs of children and
the importance of personal responsibility, case managers would like child
support agencies to
consider adopting more flexible policies for low-income noncustodial
parents. As it is now, case
managers at several sites must follow child support policies that leave them
with a limited range of
incentives to offer participants.
[They can’t get more flexible than this, bending themselves into a court-ordered pretzel. Don’t
want to pay child support? Don’t want
to pay for an attorney? Don’t worry, turn your divorce
into a contested custody case and profit.
“In my case, my ex's lawyer in Texas told the judge
that my ex's lawyer in CA said, if my ex
didn't pay him that United Father's of
America would...”
e-mail from a noncustodial mother.]
http://www.aaml.org/Articles/2000-6/Custody%20increasingly%20contentious.htm
Lesson 6:
Legal information and assistance on access, visitation, and child support
has proven to be extremely
popular at every site where it is offered.
With the rise in pro se divorce, the decline in government-funded
legal services (especially for
noncustodial parents), and the growth in out-of-wedlock
births, many parents have never had access
to a lawyer and are mystified about where they stand with respect to child
support, custody,
visitation, and parenting time. Pro se filings are frequently too
complicated for participants to
complete on their own. Furthermore, many participants have had negative
experiences with the
criminal justice system, which makes them reluctant to view court staff as
potential sources of help.
Every program that has offered participants legal information and assistance
with legal filings has
found this service to be greatly appreciated and utilized.
[They’re giving free legal help to fathers, but not
to mothers.]
Federal Funded Custody
Switch Hitting, DA nasty fathers rightster made a mistake and talked too much. He says the
http://www.dhhs.state.nc.us/docs/fathers.htm
Family Outreach & Counseling center, Inc. (FOCC)
in partnership with
Responsible Fatherhood Access & Visitation Program
”MALES ONLY”
Free Dinner|
Child-care will not be provided
Dates: Saturday, May 12, 19th, 26th, & June 2nd
Time:
Where: Greater
FREE Continental Breakfast will be served at each workshop session
Workshop fee is based on your involvement with the
Responsible Fatherhood Access and Visitation Program:
$15-20 per
workshop depending on level of involvement
$50 per
workshop if not involved with the program
**Please call (704) 358-6239 or (704) 333-2033 to determine the fee amount
Lesson 7:
Peer support and case management help to cultivate the sense of
concern and dignity that
participants appreciate experiencing.
Responsible fatherhood programs help participants overcome their isolation
and marginalization by
helping individuals realize that they are not alone, by listening and according
respectful treatment
to participants, and by demonstrating genuine concern for and
trying to help participants. These are
new experiences for many participants, and they are powerful because they
contrast so starkly with
the disrespectful treatment participants have often experienced in their normal
interactions with
bureaucracies. Peer support and case management help programs communicate
concern, help
participants overcome their isolation, and motivate participants to make
pro-social changes in their
attitude and behavior.
["Dan Quayle Was
Right," ? This was posted by “Manny Festo” no
doubt John Knight aka Danial
Amneus of the anti-Semitic Fathers Manifesto, and
written by Rev. James Dobson. “The
long-awaited report from the U.S. Census Bureau was released May 15, reflecting
population trends and living patterns during the 10 year period ending in the
year 2000….and those led
by single fathers grew by almost 62 percent…"Nuclear Family in
Meltdown."… There are a few bright spots on this dark landscape, of
course. For example, the president recently nominated Dr. Wade Horn to a top
position in the Department of Health and Human Services. Some of you may
recognize Dr. Horn as the president of the National Fatherhood Initiative, an
organization that has long proclaimed the importance of the two-parent
household and warned of the increased risks that children face without a father
in their lives. If confirmed as assistant secretary of the Department of Health
and Human Services, Dr. Horn would have authority over welfare policy, child
care, child support, foster care, adoption, Head Start and refugee services.22 Not
surprisingly, however, the National Organization for Women has already trained
its guns on Dr. Horn, erroneously suggesting that, by supporting the view that
stable families with two parents are vital to child development, he will
actually be pressuring women to "stay married to men who abuse them.".
Children, of course, will be the first to suffer. Barbara Dafoe
Whitehead, writing in her acclaimed article "Dan Quayle Was Right," said this about
the stresses experienced by children when their families fall apart:
All this uncertainty [in a single-parent home] can be devastating to children. Anyone who knows children knows that they are deeply conservative creatures. They like things to stay the same. So pronounced is this tendency that certain children have been known to request the same peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich for lunch for years on end. Children are particularly set in their ways when it comes to family, friends, neighborhoods, and schools. Yet when a family breaks up, all these things may change. The novelist Pat Conroy has observed that "each divorce is the death of a small civilization." No one feels this more acutely than children.]
Father's Manifesto massive federal funding and their anti-Semitic tripe http://fathersmanifesto.org/ ,
signatories include CRC and ACFC's
Stuart Miller,
http://www.backlash.com/content/gender/1994/12-dec94/page9.html]
Lesson 8: There is no single formula for recruitment and retention; many strategies need to be used to attract various populations. Referrals from child support agencies and mandatory referrals are important sources and should not be overlooked.
Recruiting program participants takes a lot of energy, time, and initiative. Programs should use many strategies to attract different populations, including the use of mass media and referrals from public agencies. Even sites that actively cultivate community referrals rely heavily on referrals from child support technicians. The projects help technicians as well by giving them a new, more humane "enforcement" remedy. Mandatory referrals from child protective agencies, courts, jail diversion programs, and criminal justice agencies are also important at most of the sites and are believed to promote cohesion by ensuring a group of regular attendees. The dichotomy between "voluntary" and "mandatory" participants may be less meaningful than expected, with some mandatory clients becoming eager and whole-hearted participants and some voluntary clients dropping out. The key appears to be triggering an individual's internal commitment to the program and the plan of action it inspires.
Wade Horn and he National
Fatherhood Initiative has received a $500,000 grant award to finance a
targeted public education campaign throughout the year 2001. Funds will be
utilized to write, produce, distribute, and market two new television public
service announcements and to facilitate marketing, distribution, tracking, and
follow-up activities conducted by the Ad Council and a prominent ad agency for
the entire 2001 public education campaign. (posted
Lesson
9: Recruiting young or new fathers has not been easy. Efforts based at
hospitals have not been successful where they have been tried; programs are
experimenting with school-based referrals.
To date, only two sites have aggressively pursued referrals from hospitals and
other health facilities that serve newly delivering, unmarried parents. Despite
considerable staff energy dedicated to recruitment, however, there have not
been many referrals. Several factors make it difficult to do outreach in
hospital settings: brief hospital stays, rival goals and concerns, and high
staff turnover on maternity floors are but a few. Some of the same factors also
affect outreach at postpartum settings, with fathers tending not to be on
scene, and visiting nurses and other public health personnel being extremely
preoccupied with immunizations, nutrition, and effective baby care. Some
programs are exploring alternative ways to reach young fathers, and have begun
to teach classes at local high schools and deploy younger staff members to do
one-on-one recruiting at youth groups and churches.
http://www.fatherhood.org/psa_tv.htm
Lesson 10:
Programs need to have dedicated and energetic staff who know about community
services and are good at identifying resources.
The success of the Responsible Fatherhood Demonstration Projects appears to be
tied to the commitment of the staff. Reaching alienated and disenfranchised populations
and convincing them to change their attitudes and behaviors is hard work. It
takes time, persistence, repeated contacts, fast action, patience, firmness,
and endless resourcefulness. Programs need to recruit key program staff who are inspired and inspiring. They also need to be
knowledgeable about community services in order to maximize opportunities for
participants. First-hand knowledge is key. The best
referrals are not made out of directories, but result from long-standing
familiarity with community services, eligibility requirements, available
resources, and relevant personnel. Dedicated, knowledgeable, and energetic
staff can better counsel and steer parents into a course of action that makes
them more financially and emotionally responsible for their children.
http://www.fatherhood.org/psa_radio.htm
Chapter I
The Context and Setting for the Responsible Fatherhood Programs
This is a preliminary analysis of the eight Responsible Fatherhood Demonstration Projects funded by the federal Office of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE) in late 1997. It focuses on how the programs are administered; the types of services each program delivers; the coalitions that have been created between the programs, community-based organizations, and state and local service agencies; how program participants are recruited; and how each program monitors client progress. This report covers the time period from initial start-up in late 1997 through December 1999. It documents the implementation of the projects and the major changes that have occurred at the sites with respect to program administration, goals, recruitment, and service delivery. Future reports will focus on the outcomes the projects achieve with respect to enhanced employment, education, access, parenting, and child support payments.
Historical Context of the Programs
Since OCSE's inception in 1975, Congress has gradually expanded the federal role in child support and given the program new tools so that it can more effectively handle increasingly larger caseloads and meet the more aggressive performance goals established by the passage of legislation in 1984, 1988, and 1996. The child support program now includes (Legler, 1996):
Case Management:
http://www.ancpr.org/caselaw.htm
http://www.fatherhoodcoalition.org/
http://www.infoline.org/Parents/Fathers/CTPrograms.asp
http://www.ncfm.org/readdiv.htm
__________________________________________________________
1 While we recognize that either mothers or fathers may be noncustodial parents, most of the research being cited has been conducted with noncustodial fathers. As a result, this section of the report uses the term “fathers.”
[What about the thousands of battered women and noncustodial mothers like Jeannie Wrightson,
who make less than $20,000 per year, who was court ordered to pay her wealthy securities
analyst/international distributor/child pornographer husband child support,
while his child support was exhonerated by the State
of Georgia?] Creative
Loafing "Losing Custody"
__________________________________________________________________
Enhancing the employment status and earning capacity of men at lower education
and skill levels appears to be one of the most promising ways to encourage poor
fathers to assume more parental responsibilities, including the payment of
child support. Several studies support this conclusion. In a 1995 study, for
example, Testa and Krogh
found that single African American men with stable employment are twice as
likely to marry the mother of the children they conceive out of wedlock. A 1990
study of 289 single teen-mother families on AFDC in
http://www.omsys.com/mmcd/courtrev.htm
An excellent study on the incidence of sexual
abuse in divorce was done by Thoennes and Tjaden of the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts
Research Unit in
While it is popularly believed that all allegations of sexual abuse in divorce
involved the mother accusing the father, that was not
the case. Mothers accused biological fathers in only 48 percent of the cases.
Stepfathers were accused by mothers in 6 percent of cases. Fathers accused
mothers or mother’s new partner in 16 percent of cases and dads accused third
parties in another 6 percent of cases. The remainder of
accusations were made by third parties.9
Half of the allegations of sexual abuse among the
custody/visitation dispute group, overall, were considered founded. In 33
percent of cases, no abuse was believed to have occurred and in 17 percent no
determination could be reached.10 These figures are about the same as
validation rates for cases reported to child protective agencies.11
Mother’s allegations against father were considered likely to have been
accurate in 49 percent of cases and unlikely in 33 percent. Father’s
allegations against mother were considered likely in 42 percent of cases and
unlikely in 41 percent. The remainder of the cases were
indeterminate.12
To get a different view of this issue, consider
that approximately 1,000,000 divorces are granted per year. About 600,000 of
divorcing couples have minor children, but only about 90,000 have custody
disputes.13 If only 2 percent of disputed custody or
visitation cases have allegations of sexual abuse, then only about 3 out of
every 1,000 divorces involving children have allegations of sexual abuse. This
is not an epidemic.
Research in
In
The beliefs that false allegations of sexual
abuse in divorce are epidemic and that it is mothers who falsely accuse fathers
are not supported by good, methodologically sound research.]
Enhancing the noncustodial parent's access to the
child has often been suggested as another means of encouraging voluntary
payment among obligors at all income levels. Although the research evidence is mixed (see e.g.,
Weitzman, 1985; Berkman,
1986), most studies do find a positive correlation between visitation and
support performance. For example, more than two decades ago, Chambers (1979)
found that fathers with little or no contact with their children after the
divorce paid only about 34 percent of their child support, while fathers in
regular contact paid 85 percent. A decade ago, Seltzer (1991) reached similar
conclusions when she analyzed a national probability sample of adults in the
Divorced
Fathers Make Strongest Impact With Child Support, Penn State University, Dr. Valerie King, Divorced fathers
help their children more by consistent payment of their child support than by
the number of visits made to their children
Improving child support payment may also be a means of increasing access. It has been impossible to
definitively discern a causal relationship because access and child support
compliance are so interrelated and visitation is so difficult to accurately
measure (Cabrera and Evans, 2000; Pearson and Thoennes,
1988). However, in her most recent analysis of the 1987-88 National Survey of
Families and Households, Seltzer (2000: 56) concludes that paying "child
support may have a small direct effect [on access], even after father's
visiting patterns have been established." Similarly, Edin,
et al. (2000) conclude that fathers who could not
provide economically felt a sense of shame that often led them to withdraw from
their children. Whether payment leads to contact, contact leads to payment, or
both contact and payment are the result of other variables, such as a sense of
commitment, it is clear that fathers who see their children do a better job of
paying support.
In light of these findings, child support policies have increasingly moved toward approaches that emphasize ability and willingness to pay support. The Child Access Demonstration Projects were the first official steps that the federal Office of Child Support Enforcement took to support interventions aimed at addressing the issues of access and visitation. Implemented in seven different states, the project involved the use of mediation, parent education, counseling, and other measures to assist parents in communicating about the needs of their children following parental separation and divorce, and to increase the involvement of fathers in the lives of their children.
The evaluation of
the Child Access Demonstration Projects revealed that although the
interventions had only limited success in solving access problems among extremely disputatious
and highly conflicted couples, they did assist many noncustodial
parents in the resolution of their access problems. Fully 65 to 70 percent of
those who attempted to mediate reached an agreement; mediation and other access
interventions garnered high levels of user satisfaction from both custodial and
noncustodial parents. Despite these positive
outcomes, access interventions had only limited impact on child support payment
patterns, which tended to track with the financial resources of the noncustodial parent rather than his access situation
(Price, et al., 1994; Pearson, et al., 1996; Pearson and Thoennes,
1997; Pearson and Thoennes, 1999).
In a second demonstration project, the Parents' Fair Share Demonstration
(PFS), the Administration on Children and Families (ACF), along with the
Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE), the Department of
Labor, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture, experimented with a
comprehensive approach to assist under- or unemployed noncustodial
parents with becoming more financially and emotionally involved in the lives of
their children. The model that was adopted at seven research sites included
employment assistance, peer support, case management, and temporarily lowered
child support orders. The findings reported to date indicate that offering
services helps to distinguish between those who are unwilling to pay and those
who are unable to pay (i.e., identifying unreported employment and
resources, and raising child support payments). Although there was improved
child support compliance, the services had little effect on improving earnings
and employment for most participants (Martinez and Miller, 2000; Johnson and Doolittle, 1995; Doolittle and
Lynn, 1998). The exception to this were the most
disadvantaged fathers, who experienced moderate improvements in employment and
earnings (
Arguing that PFS's disappointing results were due to the fact that most clients were referred by the courts, had substantial child support debts, and had been separated from their children for a number of years, some researchers have urged PFS-like programs to focus on serving unwed fathers at the birth of their babies when they are attached to the mothers and their babies, and have high hopes for raising their children (McLanahan, 1999). This is the approach that will be employed by Partners for Fragile Families. Under this demonstration project, the National Center for Strategic Nonprofit Planning and Community Leadership (NPCL), with Ford Foundation support, (2) made awards to 10 states to implement demonstration projects requiring that child support agencies and community-based organizations collaborate to recruit and assist poor noncustodial parents for the purpose of promoting employment, paternal contact, and child support payment.
2 These projects were recently granted waivers to receive matching funds from the federal Office of Child Support Enforcement
Department
of Health & Human Services, Fatherhood Initiative, HHS and its Regional Offices are working to coordinate
fatherhood activities throughout the states and have sponsored a variety of
forums to bring together local public and private organizations and individuals
to support fathers… Access
and Visitation. The
Based upon the growing interest in increasing father involvement with
their children, Congress included measures in its welfare reform legislation to
address the access and economic problems of noncustodial
parents. In 1997, 1998, and 1999, Congress appropriated $10 million to states
to promote the development of a variety of programs designed to alleviate the
problems associated with access and visitation. The Personal Responsibility and
Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act also requires states to have the authority
to order noncustodial parents who are delinquent in
child support into work activities if their children are receiving public
assistance, and approximately 18 states have developed programs to provide
employment and training services to low-income noncustodial
fathers (Sorensen, 1997). Congressional interest has remained high, and in
1999, the House of Representatives passed the Fathers Count Act of 1999 (H.R.
3073), which proposes spending $140 million over four years to support and
evaluate projects to help fathers meet their responsibilities as husbands,
parents, and providers. To date, no corresponding bill has been passed by the
Senate.
Support for demonstration projects promoting responsible fatherhood has
continued at OCSE. In 1997, following a competitive process, the agency made
multi-year awards to seven states to conduct demonstration projects that
provide services to noncustodial parents designed to
promote their financial and emotional participation in the lives of their
children. In 1997, HHS also granted
Chapter 2
Profile of the Programs
The following is a brief description of the responsible fatherhood programs
operating at the eight sites funded by OCSE and their status as of
Administered by the child support enforcement agency in
[1st Annual Fatherhood Breakfast http://www.co.sanmateo.ca.us/cmo/annualreport2000/health.html
The Dads Count Breakfast was co-chaired by
Supervisor Jerry Hill and Judge Phrasel Shelton and
initiated by the Fatherhood Collaborative of
The most commonly used intervention to resolve parental conflict after a separation or divorce and to promote parent-child contact is mediation. Mediation services are provided by a mediator at the domestic relations court, who was hired expressly under the grant to serve program clients. The court-based mediation program conducts divorce mediations for the court, but has traditionally served cases set for hearing. Thanks to the grant, all Family Support Division clients are eligible for mediation services at no charge to the parties, although participation is voluntary. Referrals are made by all types of child support personnel, including customer service representatives, attorneys, establishment technicians, and enforcement staff. Child support staff view the offer of free mediation as an effective way of responding to parents who mention access problems when discussing their non-compliance with child support. Staff refer clients regularly for mediation, and program staff report that about half of those referred follow through and attend a mediation session. Mediation is typically conducted in a single session, although clients can pursue additional mediation with staff at a community-based organization providing a variety of support services for families.
Employment assistance is available for parents who indicate that they are
unemployed and consequently unable to pay child support. Staff
make referrals to Success
Central, the county vendor providing employment assistance to TANF clients.
To date, very few noncustodial parents have taken
advantage of this option.
Normally, there is no case management for project participants; most are served
in a single mediation session. A fraction of clients, however, may be referred by mediators for case
management, parent education, and/or supervised visitation services offered at
the Family Service Agency. In addition, some families may avail
themselves of these services directly as a result of public outreach campaigns
conducted by both the child support agency and the Family Service Agency.
As part of its fatherhood project, the San Mateo County Family Support Division
hired a half-time community outreach coordinator to improve both client and
community knowledge about the child support program and the services available
to assist clients of the Family Support Division. The Division's outreach
activities have included:
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
[http://www.hewlett.org/grants/2000/fam_com00.htm
2000 Family & Community Development Grants
as of
Responsible Fatherhood
and Male Involvement
Alameda County Bar Association,
Volunteer Legal Services Corporation,
($90,000/1 year)
For the Family Advocates Law project
Boys and Girls Club of the
($15,000/1 year)
For the fatherhood program at the Center for a New Generation
Fairfax-San Anselmo
Children’s Center,
($65,000/1 year)
For the Bay Area Male Involvement Network
($40,000/1 year)
For the Proud Fathers program
Institute for the Advanced Study
of Black Family Life and Culture,
($65,000/2 years)
For the HAWK Federation program
Jewish
Family and Children’s Services,
($180,000/2 years)
For the Fathers’ Support project
Male Advocacy in Pregnancy and Parenting
Coalition,
($75,000/1 year)
For general support
National
Center for Strategic Nonprofit Planning and Community Leadership,
($400,000/3 years)
For the Bay Area Partners for Fragile Families project
The University of Pennsylvania, National
Center on Fathers and Families, Philadelphia, PA
($350,000/2 years)
For Phase II of the Fathering Integrated Data System project
Princeton University, Center for Research on
Child Wellbeing,
($200,000/3 years)
For the Oakland-based component of the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing study
Pro Bono Project of
($90,000/1 year)
For the Family Law Advocates program
San Francisco Bar
Association, Volunteer Legal Services Program,
($90,000/1 year)
For the Family Law Advocates program
Total: 12 grants totaling
$1,660,000]
Project staff estimate that 300 clients received mediation services in 1999
and that 51 clients were referred for employment services. Project staff believe that the offer of employment services has had
the effect of identifying previously undisclosed employment among some targeted
clients. Among those referred, none had any payments in the 12 months prior to
referral. After referral,
about half made at least one child support payment. Staff also estimate
that mediation stimulated payment among those who had made no child support
payments in the six months prior to mediation, with the average increase in
collections standing at $1,461 for each case that reached an agreement. The
evaluators will be assessing these patterns in greater detail in subsequent
studies of project outcomes.
Administered by the El Paso County Department of Human Services in
The project is staffed by a coordinator and one full-time and one half-time case managers, with specialized liaison workers at Maximus, Goodwill, and the Women's Resource Agency. During an intake interview with a POP case manager, noncustodial parents tell their story, develop a case plan (which results in a signed contract), and receive referrals to appropriate support services, including employment assistance and personalized child support interventions. Other agencies provide services on an as-needed basis, including mediation through the Office of Dispute Resolution in the Fourth Judicial District, and other community organizations for supervised visitation, counseling, drug and alcohol evaluations, and mental health treatment. The child support agency suspends child support obligations for eligible participants for up to three months and will review and modify orders. The Women's Resource Agency has been especially helpful in contacting custodial mothers to see if they are willing to mediate or agree to temporary support abatements. The Agency also offers supportive services to custodial parents, and stresses the importance of fathers in children's lives.
The majority of the 100 clients referred to the project by the end of 1999 were referred by child support technicians. In the first year of operations, each establishment technician at Maximus was instructed to send a specified number of cases to the program each month. This policy was subsequently revised, and both establishment and enforcement technicians have been asked to refer any relevant case to the program. Technicians convey their referrals directly to POP case managers so that project staff may make direct contact if individuals fail to make contact on their own. Over time, referrals from other sources have grown considerably. Non-child support referrals are routinely made by community corrections and parole officers, court-appointed special advocates in child abuse and neglect cases, and other community agencies.
The Center on Fathering, which is a special unit within social services, has provided a variety of services to POP participants, including (at various times) peer support interventions, classes on conflict resolution, and fathering/co-parenting classes.
The OCSE grant to the Community Services Administration of the Maryland
Department of Human Resources funds two Responsible Fatherhood Demonstration
Projects. In
One objective of Baltimore RFP was to expand the type of services provided
by YF/RF to the southern quadrant of the city, which is economically distressed
and geographically isolated. As part of that effort, Baltimore RFP collaborated
with two key entities in
Baltimore RFP targets unwed or expectant fathers (including
those who are in intact families) ages 14 to 45 who
"are at risk of forsaking their parental responsibilities . . . due to
social and economic disadvantages." Clients meet with case managers for an
intake assessment, during which they identify their needs, capabilities, and
goals.
All clients are instructed to attend six months of weekly, two-hour
parenting/peer support sessions. Baltimore RFP uses the Responsible Fatherhood
Program curriculum developed by the
In addition to the parenting/peer support component, clients w