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Why Alabama Needs The Department of Children's Affairs

The Department of Children's Affairs advises the Governor and Legislature in matters relating to children’s issues and serves as a liaison between state agencies serving children; it coordinates state and local efforts through a network of policy councils; seeks grant funding for programs, provides training and facilitation of efforts in every county of the state. It established and maintains the only centralized registry of information concerning children’s programs and receives and compiles needs assessments from all counties in order to provide a unified report to the Governor and Legislature regarding the needs of children and families.

The Commissioner of the Department of Children's Affairs serves as chairman of the Alabama Children’s Policy Council and the DCA performs all of the duties and mission of the council (the CPC’s annual budget is only $20,000) including monitoring and reporting of Children First Trust Fund expenditures and granting the approval to each agencies plan of investment which is required by law for allocation of Children First monies.

The Department of Children's Affairs develops and coordinates grant applications for local agencies and provides training in administration through its field directors and VISTA volunteers. The Department of Children's Affairs collaborates on grants such as the $9,000,000 Unified Prevention System grant for which over 20 CPC’s applied.

What Alabama Would Lose Without DCA

 Children’s Policy Councils
   o Many Children’s Policy Councils would die across the state.
   o DCA serves as the primary contact for the 67 Children’s Policy Councils. DCA has provided the structure, encouragement and training for the development of these councils. These councils have put Alabama in a strong position for the application for additional federal funds. Many federal grants now require the applicant to be a coalition with membership similar to the CPC.
o Children’s Policy Councils would loose support from DCA Field Directors.
   o DCA employees 3 full time Field Directors who attend CPC meetings and assist the councils by providing training and a line of communication between the state and community.
   o 15 Children’s Policy Councils would loose VISTA workers who assist the councils with their work.
   o These full time positions have been extremely successful over the past six months helping the local councils achieve real change for children. They are provided through an exclusive agreement between DCA and AmeriCorps.

 Needs Assessment
   o There would no longer be an annual Needs Assessment conducted
   o DCA receives Needs Assessments annually from the Children’s Policy Councils. DCA then analyzes this information and develops a comprehensive report to the Legislature based on this information. These assessments identify the most critical needs of children across the state.

 Children First
   o Accountability and reporting for the Children First Trust Fund would be lost.
   o DCA is charged with monitoring and reporting Children First expenses by the 12 CFTF agencies. DCA must approve the agencies plans of investment before money is spent, compile monthly reports to the Legislature, and develop the annual report for the fund. This management function has been extremely successful in informing Legislators and the public about the successes of the Children First Trust Fund.

 Resource Database
   o The state will not have a directory of services.
   o DCA is charged with developing and maintaining a comprehensive database of services for children and families. DCA is currently leading a project that would develop the first comprehensive database of all services, public and private, across the entire state, which will be available to the entire state and facilitate the creation of local resource centers in every county. This database could also be tied to the state accounting system to allow the Legislature to more effectively track state expenditures.

 Coordination of Services
   o Boards, commissions, and task forces across the state will loose a powerful voice for children and grassroots councils.
   o The Commissioner of DCA serves on many boards and commissions representing the voices of children and local councils rather than a state agency. This voice has improved responsiveness to local needs and has allowed several groups to more effectively tailor services to the needs of communities.


 Pre-K Standards and Programs
   o Alabama’s Early Education Programs will be adversely affected.
   o The Office of School Readiness, which developed the Alabama Pre-K standards for 4 year olds and funds 54 pre-k sites across the state is under the Department of Children's Affairs which is responsible for its administration and budget operations.
   o The Head Start Collaboration Office is maintained through a federal grant agreement directly with the Department of Children's Affairs which could not be renewed.