Chapter 1. Introduction

In this chapter

1.1 Policy Context
1.2 Assessing Coordination in Child Support and Domestic Violence Strategies

Collecting child support for TANF recipients is a complicated process, particularly for custodial parents who are victims of domestic violence. Multiple agencies, including child support and public assistance agencies, are responsible for gaining clients’ cooperation, collecting information to locate noncustodial parents, establishing paternity, creating a child support order, and enforcing that order. Differing agency goals and responsibilities can make it difficult for them to coordinate their efforts in ways that ensure that the interests of the parents and children are best served. Because of the legislation’s increased emphasis on employment, public assistance agencies are now focusing more on helping clients find jobs, which may include greater efforts to identify work barriers such as domestic violence, refer clients to supportive services, and monitor compliance with participation requirements. Child support agencies, on the other hand, are concerned with establishing paternity and child support orders, as well as enforcing legal obligations.

Collecting child support for victims of domestic violence, however, presents special concerns that are often heightened if interagency coordination is weak. These concerns stem in part from the inherent conflict that can arise between the need for financial support from child support payments and the need for safety from abuse. Unless she chooses to forego the child support payment because the risk of abuse is too great to warrant its pursuit, women who are victims of domestic violence must comply with the requirements for cooperation with the child support enforcement process. These very requirements, however, can increase the risk of harm

for the victim of domestic violence by alerting her abuser to her location; bringing the victim and abuser into near proximity during courtroom proceedings; and/or angering an abuser by automatic procedures such as wage withholding or a driver’s license suspension. If women who fear their abusers choose not to pursue child support, on the other hand, they impair their ability to become self-sufficient through the loss of resources for themselves and their children. Most victims of domestic violence do not want to forego these resources, and yet want to ensure their own safety and that of their children.

The coordination of safety and child support receipt can be further complicated by the specifics of the family situation. The abusing partner or former partner may be the parent of all, some or none of the children for whom child support is being sought. There may also be more than one former partner with a history of abusive behavior. The collection of child support could illicit an abusive response by a child’s father, but it could also illicit an abusive response by a jealous current partner who is threatened by the financial independence child support (or employment) could provide. Systems must be developed that can take into account the specifics of each family in determining the best strategy for assuring both safety and child support.

Among its major policy provisions, recent federal welfare reform legislation sought to strengthen enforcement of child support for TANF recipients while concurrently helping to protect women who are victims of domestic violence. The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) of 1996 expands penalties for noncustodial parents who fail to pay support and for custodial parents who, without good cause, do not cooperate with the child support enforcement process. In addition, recognizing that domestic violence victims may not be able to comply with the new legislation’s cooperation requirements, PRWORA includes two provisions that, under certain circumstances, exempt victims of domestic violence from requirements for cooperating with enforcement: the IV-D good cause policy and the Family Violence Option (FVO).

The current legislation’s dual emphasis on two tenuously linked objectives—child support enforcement and protection of victims of domestic violence—has intensified the need for states to develop a response system that improves the coordination of information and delivery of services among public assistance and child support agencies. This need is particularly acute for victims of domestic violence who seek to collect the financial resources from child support payments. PRWORA takes an important step by establishing provisions to ensure the safety of domestic violence victims who want exemption from child support cooperation requirements. However, it leaves largely undefined the policies and procedures that local offices should follow to protect the safety of the majority of domestic violence victims who want to pursue child support payments. In the absence of such guidance, there is greater likelihood that the exchange of information and services between public assistance and child support agencies is not well coordinated. For victims of domestic violence, this lack of coordination poses enormous risk to their safety, the safety of their children, and their chances for becoming self-sufficient.

Mathematica Policy Research, Inc. (MPR), in collaboration with the Urban Institute, have examined what selected local communities in Massachusetts, Minnesota, Missouri, and Oregon have done to improve the coordination of this response system. Through grant support from the Office of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, these agencies are experimenting with child support and domestic violence policies and procedures in order to meet both the safety and self-sufficiency needs of TANF clients.

In 1997, OCSE offered funding under Section 1115 of the Social Security Act to states for the development of child support enforcement policies and procedures to address domestic violence concerns and other reasons for non-cooperation. Three states who were awarded these grants in October of 1997 – Massachusetts, Minnesota, and Missouri – designed three-year projects to (1) collect information on the incidence of noncooperation, good cause exemptions, and domestic violence claims in the child support process; and (2) test approaches to identifying, referring, and pursuing child support payments on behalf of potential or actual victims of domestic violence. The states were required to implement their demonstration projects and to conduct evaluations of them. The Center for Policy Research in Denver, Colorado is currently evaluating the demonstrations for Massachusetts and Minnesota, and the University of Missouri in Columbia is evaluating that state’s demonstration. These state-funded evaluations will examine issues such as reasons for non-cooperation with the child support requirements; screening for barriers to cooperation; disclosure rates of domestic violence and factors associated with differences in these rates; client understanding of good cause exemptions; rates of interest in waivers and good cause; and the types of assistance requested by clients. This report does not focus on the issues addressed as part of the separate state evaluations.

Our report, funded by OCSE, focuses specifically on the strategies that the child support and public assistance agencies in selected sites have taken to improve the interagency coordination of information and services for victims of domestic violence with regard to the child support collection process. This includes both domestic violence victims who want an exemption from the mandatory child support collection process and those who want to collect child support, if it can be done safely. The report looks across the four selected sites to assess what agencies are doing to address the growing need for interagency coordination as they are pushed by new federal policies to extend their traditional boundaries and partners. Sometimes this coordination of effort extends to others, such as court personnel or staff from local domestic violence service organizations. Issues related to the intersection between agencies are critically important to examine but often are superceded by those that focus within a single agency. As such, this report constitutes an important complement to the evaluation research noted above.

Each of the states in this study has adopted the FVO. In accordance with the latitude granted under PRWORA, each has also adopted its own set of policies and procedures in areas such as how to inform women about the good cause exemption, what constitutes cooperation with the child support requirements, responsibility for the "good cause" determination, and the process to be followed for an exemption claim. In the absence of effective interagency coordination, however, gaps can exist in these procedures—in knowledge, in communication, and in concern for safety, presenting dangers for victims of domestic violence. Our focus, therefore, is on what these sites have done to improve this interagency coordination while maintaining the dual objectives of child support enforcement and protection of victims of domestic violence.

1.1. Policy Context

Domestic violence, broadly defined, is abusive or aggressive behavior by a person in an intimate relationship with the victim. The abuse can take physical, sexual, and/or emotional forms. The abuser may not be a current partner and the abuse itself may not be currently inflicted yet may still constitute a threat or concern related to child support cooperation. Because of variations in the definitions of domestic violence and the wording of survey questions used to measure its prevalence, estimates of domestic violence for welfare recipients span a wide range, from 15 to 65 percent (Johnson and Meckstroth 1998).

Recipients of public assistance are more likely to suffer from domestic violence than are nonrecipients, and the repercussions from abuse can be extensive. Victims of domestic violence cycle on and off public assistance more frequently than other recipients, are far more likely to have their work compromised by absenteeism and tardiness related to their abuse, are significantly more likely to be unemployed at some point than nonvictims, and have lower personal incomes (Lloyd 1997).

Despite—or perhaps because of—the repercussions of abuse, most women who are victims of domestic violence want to pursue child support. The percentages of domestic violence victims wanting to pursue child support, from data collected in three states (two of which—Massachusetts and Minnesota—are included in this study), range from 50 percent, for those victims who said their abuser still posed a threat of harm, to 93 percent (Griswold, Pearson, and Thoennes 2000). Because most women who disclose domestic violence want to pursue child support and turn down the option of seeking an exemption from cooperation requirements, efforts to protect their safety throughout the child support collection process are extremely important.

Preexisting policy before PRWORA did little to address the often competing goals of child support collection and personal safety. In the past, victims of domestic violence were offered two options: "to forgo child support altogether or to enter the general caseload," often referred to as the "red light" and "green light" responses to child support enforcement. Missing was the "yellow light" option which would allow for the identification of victims of domestic violence whose pursuit of child support is then carried out with procedures designed specifically to protect their safety (Turetsky and Notar 1999). Under the AFDC program, states were required to give welfare applicants a good cause written notice which advised them, often in legal terms, of the child support cooperation requirement, their right to claim a good cause exemption from cooperation, and the need to provide evidence to support this claim. Preexisting policy defined good cause to include cases with adoptions pending, cases with children who were conceived through incest or rape, and cases with victims of domestic violence. A "good cause" claim, however, was restrictive and required evidence of anticipated physical or emotional harm to a child or to the custodial parent if the harm to the parent was "of such nature or degree that it reduces the person’s capacity to care for the child adequately," often a difficult claim to substantiate (Turetsky and Notar 1999, pg. 11). If granted, these exemptions were typically for an indefinite time period, and did not specify a periodic review of possibly important changes in client circumstances.

PRWORA altered much of the previous legislation, including major provisions to enhance the child support enforcement process. The legislation adds state enforcement tools for collecting support from noncustodial parents, such as seizure of assets, license revocation, and reporting of new hires. As such, more noncustodial parents than previously—including those who are past or present abusers—will be brought into the child support system. At the same time, however, PRWORA’s provisions also increase the penalties for women who do not show good cause for failing to cooperate with child support enforcement requirements, by requiring states to reduce cash assistance for the entire family by at least 25 percent. These concurrent changes constitute a potentially dangerous combination for a woman who is a victim of domestic violence. In tandem, they may increase the likelihood that she may come in contact with her abuser, making development and provision of a "yellow light" option so important.

For domestic violence victims seeking an exemption from normal requirements to cooperate with child support enforcement efforts, federal welfare reform legislation also includes two provisions. First, PRWORA amended existing provisions on good cause waivers in Title IV-D of the Social Security Act, giving states more latitude. States can now determine how to define good cause, set standards of evidence for good cause, and decide whether public assistance or child support agencies will determine whether good cause exists. Second, the legislation introduced the FVO in Title IV-A of the Social Security Act. The FVO offers states the new option of identifying victims of domestic violence, referring them to community services, and waiving the requirement that they cooperate with child support enforcement and other aspects of TANF. For example, states can waive TANF work activity participation requirements, time limits on benefits, residency requirements, and family cap provisions. States can keep the IV-D good cause waiver and the FVO exemption processes separate, thus creating dual standards for exemptions from child support cooperation, or they can integrate the two. Those states that do not integrate these good cause standards, however, risk creating confusion for both clients and staff, duplicating efforts, and issuing inconsistent good cause determinations (Turetsky and Notar 1999).

This new state latitude, coupled with the federal lifetime limit on cash assistance, give agencies the opportunity to address the needs and concerns of domestic violence victims, and make it urgent that they do so. Under the five-year lifetime limit of support, recipients of public assistance face a greater need for expediency in their efforts to achieve self-sufficiency, of which financial stability is a key piece. For a victim of domestic violence, obtaining child support may be the linchpin in allowing her to sever dependence on her abuser. Though the financial effect while on TANF may be small, child support payments can constitute an important supplement to total income once employed and off TANF. As noted earlier, most domestic violence victims want the financial assistance that comes from collection of child support.

There are a number of issues in the demonstration sites that could be examined, many of which are being carefully assessed by the local evaluations underway and mentioned above. Our focus here is on sites’ efforts to create a coordinated interagency response to domestic violence victims’ safe pursuit—or exemption from the requirements—of child support. Key provisions of PRWORA's FVO and the IV-D good cause exemption suggest the need for agencies to expand their roles and reach across traditional agency boundaries in order to develop the type of coordination needed to meet the legislation’s objectives:

A person trained in domestic violence must conduct individualized client assessments.
A waiver from TANF requirements must be accompanied by a service plan, developed by someone trained in domestic violence, that reflects the individualized assessment.
States can decide if a public assistance or child support agency will determine good cause for waivers from child support enforcement requirements.
For those custodial parents subject to cooperation requirements, judgments about their level of cooperation have to be made by the child support agency. If agency staff determine that someone is not cooperating in good faith and therefore is not eligible for a good cause waiver, they must inform the public assistance agency, which is required to sanction clients for noncooperation.

Implementation of such efforts heightens the importance of, and benefits from, coordination between service agencies. The four sites we examine here have experimented with new procedures that entail closer cross-agency coordination than has generally been the rule. For this reason, their efforts are noteworthy and can inform other states and localities of ways to improve the response to TANF clients' dual need for child support and safety.

1.2. Assessing Coordination in Child Support and Domestic Violence Strategies

For this study, we examined public assistance and child support agencies in local communities of four states implementing the FVO and IV-D good cause policies:

Massachusetts (Boston area Department of Transitional Assistance and Department of Revenue offices);
Minnesota (Hennepin County Family Assistance Division and Collection Services Division offices, some of which are in the city of Minneapolis);
Missouri (Jackson County Division of Family Services and Division of Child Support Enforcement offices, some of which are in Kansas City); and
Oregon (Grants Pass-Josephine County and Medford-Jackson County Adult and Family Services and Division of Child Support offices).

The four states’ efforts to coordinate services for victims of domestic violence in the child support system are being carried out in varied settings and systems. Massachusetts, Minnesota, and Missouri are conducting pilot projects supported by Section 1115 funding from OCSE. Minnesota is implementing new FVO and IV-D good cause procedures for its pilot project in one county, and Massachusetts and Missouri are implementing new procedures for their pilots in one local jurisdiction and then are spreading some of them statewide. Oregon is implementing new procedures statewide.

The study is based on information gathered from a variety of data sources. Project staff reviewed materials provided by the Office of Child Support Enforcement on the state demonstration projects and the family violence option. Staff also obtained documents from the state and project sites about their grant activities and the implementation of the family violence option. Documents reviewed included training materials, policy guidelines and procedural manuals. Staff verified their understanding of project activities with appropriate state and local county staff and where necessary asked state and site specific open-ended follow-up questions on such topics as the identification and assessment of domestic violence victims, referrals to community services, waivers to exempt clients from child support cooperation requirements, and safe pursuit of child support. Discussions were held with policy analysts from state child support and public assistance agencies; administrators, supervisors and line staff from local-level child support and public assistance agencies; and representatives from statewide domestic violence advocacy groups and local domestic service providers. Descriptions of state-wide and demonstration specific activities were sent back to each state/site to ensure that information was accurate and complete.

The report discusses three broad areas in which these agencies have coordinated efforts: in their internal procedures; through the use of specialized staff; and by promoting interagency understanding of one another. What follows is a brief overview, in Chapter II, of child support and domestic violence procedures implemented in local communities or statewide in our four focal states. The profiles in Chapter II are supplemented by summaries in Appendix A, which describe in more detail statewide domestic violence and child support policies in the focal states and note where these policies differ from initiatives in selected local communities. Both the profiles and appendix summaries were reviewed and approved by staff in each site. The report in chapters III through V then explores in greater detail the approaches that these sites are taking to pursuing child support while protecting the safety of domestic violence victims. We focus on those approaches that entail effort to coordinate agencies' activities in some way in their respective efforts to meet clients' needs. Specifically, Chapter III examines internal agency procedures that have been refined to develop a more coordinated flow of information in order to protect the safety of domestic violence victims during the child support process. Chapter IV discusses the use of staff specialists in ways that draw on the expertise of partner agencies. Chapter V examines collaborative efforts to increase staff knowledge of the missions and procedures of other agencies. Chapter VI, in concluding, provides a summary of the broad areas in which agency coordination has attempted to bridge gaps and address the safety concerns of TANF clients who are victims of domestic violence.