Human Services

Children’s Services Grants

Statewide Outcome(s):

Children’s Services Grants supports the following statewide outcome(s).

People in Minnesota are safe.

Strong and stable families and communities.

Context:

Having strong families and communities is an effective first line of defense for keeping children safe, especially in times of stress. Children who have been abused and neglected are more likely to perform poorly in school, get involved in criminal activities and abuse or neglect their own children. Programs and services that cultivate the factors shared by strong families and communities actually minimize long-term costs, such as intervention for crime, corrections, truancy, hospitalization, special education and mental health care.

Research provdes compelling evidence that strength-based child welfare interventions such as those funded with Children’s Services Grants, result in safer children and more stable families. Without these services, children and families remain at risk.

Children’s Services Grants seek to ensure the safety, permanency and well-being of children involved in the child protection system. In 2011, 17,716 reports of child abuse and neglect were assessed involving 24,962 children. Of these, 4,589 children were determined to be victims of child maltreatment. In the same year, 11,368 children experienced an out-of-home placement and 1,133 were either adopted or had a permanent transfer of legal custody to a relative.

Grants in this activity are funded through a combination of state and federal dollars, including federal foster care, state and federal Adoption Assistance, and federal Family Preservation and Family Support Grants.

Strategies:

Children’s Services grants fund a continuum of statewide child welfare services including adoption assistance, Indian Child Welfare services, child protection, homeless youth services, and child abuse and neglect services through counties, tribes, and community based providers. Grants provide supports to help keep more children out of foster care and safely with their families, and to decrease the disproportionate number of children of color in out-of-home placements. Most recently these grants have been used to:

·         Reform the child welfare system to focus on ensuring children’s safety while supporting families;

·         Improve the Minnesota Child Welfare Training System;

·         Work with tribes to design and develop tribal approaches that ensure child safety and permanency; and

·         Transfer responsibilities from counties to tribes to deliver a full continuum of child welfare services to American Indian children and families on two reservations.

These services are essential in keeping children safe and families stable.

Results:

The Department of Human Services monitors the performance of counties and tribes in delivering child welfare services. Minnesota outcomes match or exceed most federal standards. Efforts to engage families early and collaboratively, and provide evidenced-based services with a focus on safety and timely permanency, have resulted in improving or maintaining outcomes.

Performance Measures Notes:

All measures are from Minnesota’s Child Welfare Report. Measurements compare 2010 data (Previous) to 2011 data (Current). Child protection statistical reports are posted on the DHS Child protection Publications page: http://www.dhs.state.mn.us/main/id_003712.

See also Child Welfare Dashboard:

http://www.dhs.state.mn.us/main/idcplg?IdcService=GET_DYNAMIC_CONVERSION&RevisionSelectionMethod=LatestReleased&dDocName=dhs16_148137