AB 1331 requires counties to screen all foster youth for potential SSI/SSP eligibility when foster youth are at least 16.5 years of age and no more than 17.5 years of age. The statute also addresses the problem with current federal regulations, which causes the denial of SSI to youth getting foster care benefits over the SSI level of PRIOR to having a medical eligibility determination. Counties are to forego federal AFDC-FC benefits for the potentially SSI/SSP eligible youth for one month, during which time an SSI/SSP application is submitted. Social Security agreed to accept and process applications for foster youth during the month they are in receipt of State AFDC-FC. Counties thus must transfer a youth from federal AFDC-FC to State AFDC-FC for one month while the SSI/SSP application is submitted. After the one month transfer, the youth must be transferred back to federal AFDC-FC. The letter reminds counties to submit applications early enough to allow a determination to be made by SSA as to the youth’s eligibility PRIOR to the youth’s emancipation (estimating this takes six months!). Once the youth has been determined to be medically eligible for SSI/SSP, if the youth is in receipt of federal AFDC-FC benefits in excess to what they would receive in SSI/SSP, counties can request that the SSA put the youth’s SSI/SSP benefits in suspense for up to 12 months.

Though effective January 1, 2008, no additional funds to implement the bill are available in the current Fiscal Year. The ACL encourages counties to implement AB 1331 with existing allocations. [Download]

Effective January 1, 2008, counties can use of federal Foster Care funds for children who are both foster care children and regional center clients. The county must document that the children have extraordinary and unusual special behavioral or medical needs that make them difficult to place, and get federal funds only when placed in for-profit group care facilities when no other comparable nonprofit facility exists that is willing to accept placement and capable of meeting the child’s needs. The county is limited to no more than five such children per county at any one time, and only for a maximum of 12 cumulative months, per child. [Download]

HSS came out with new guidelines for temporary absences and linkage to the TANF program, are are implemented in California by this ACL. Full grants will be paid for brief absences of less than 14 days, after which the grant will be prorated. For linkage, eligibility criteria, including deprivation, must be met in the month of, but
prior to, the child’s removal from the home. The State may not establish the child’s
deprivation based on household circumstances that occur after a child’s removal. The parental deprivation which happened concurrent with or after the child’s removal cannot be used to satisfy deprivation requirements. [Download]

Title says it all. Any time after 1/1/08 that a foster care/probation placement application is made, all counties must contact the child abuse and neglect registry of each state in which a prospective foster or adoptive parent, relative caregiver, or nonrelative extended family member (including any other adult in the home) has resided in the past five years. In particular, it briefly reviews the process for approving a relative or nonrelative extended family member (NREFM) home.

Clarification on when a child is a “candidate” for foster care, for purposes of getting IV-E funds for pre-placement prevention services.  The definition of “candidate” is that the child be “at serious risk of removal”  as evidenced by the state agency either pursuing his/her removal from the home or making reasonable efforts to prevent such removal,” this was interpreted too broadly.  The clarification states that “a decision must have been made that the next step for the child was foster care.”  In California, this can be documented in one of 3 ways: 1) A defined case plan which clearly indicates that, absent effective preventive services, foster care is the planned arrangement for the child; 2) Evidence of court removal proceedings ; OR 3) An eligibility determination form completed by the County Welfare Department which establishes the child’s eligibility under Title IV-E.  Documentation needs to be done every 6 months.  [Download] 

The letter implements AB 1774, and clarifies for whom and how a county child welfare agency or probation department obtains state and federal level criminal history information as part of the process of assessing a relative or nonrelative extended family member for placement. These primarily are technical changes.

The decision whether to seek to obtain the parent’s or legal guardian’s criminal history is made on a case-by-case basis, and the information may only be obtained if the parent or legal guardian has agreed to submit fingerprints for this purpose as part of the family reunification case plan. Only criminal record history that occurred subsequent to the removal of the child can be considered. In addition, once the Department of Justice (DOJ) has provided the criminal record history, a request for subsequent arrest notification cannot be made. In order to obtain a criminal record history, the county child welfare agency or probation department must submit Live Scan fingerprint transactions to the DOJ. [Download]