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Volume III | Chapter 1 [GENERAL: NONDISCRIMINATION COMPLIANCE]

Revised 06-01-06

County Office Complaints received in the county office will be immediately forwarded to the State Office with a copy of the complaint to the Regional Office. The State Office will acknowledge receipt of the complaint to the complainant within five (5) working days. A copy of the acknowledgment will be mailed to the county office and regional office. State Office Complaints received in the State Office will be logged in by the Office of Field Operations and referred to the county and regional offices for investigation. The State Office will acknowledge receipt of the complaint to the complainant within five (5) working days. A copy of the acknowledgment will be mailed to the county office and regional office. Based on the analysis of the complaint, one of three (3) situations will occur: a. Referral: cases received that required no action; cases in this category will be considered closed at this point. b. Age discrimination: cases will be forwarded to the Regional OCR. c. Investigation: cases that contain alleged violations in the TANF program, a prohibited basis of discrimination and an adverse action, as determined by the complainant. An onsite investigation must consist of an interview with the complainant. The investigation may be discontinued at this step if the complainant indicates that discrimination did not occur; that he/she understands how the case was handled; does not wish to pursue the complaint; or withdraws the complaint. The person conducting the investigation should obtain a signed statement from the complainant at this point. The signed statement should be included with the investigative report. If investigation is necessary to substantiate or refute the allegations, the following steps will be taken in addition to the interview with the complainant: (1) review of the complainant’s case file; (2) review of other similarly situated case files concluding with not less than ten percent of the random number of similar case files from the total number of case files in either a caseload or from the applicant pool; (3) interviews with management in the county office; (4) interviews with relevant witnesses and other applicants/participants; and (5) interviews with representative of grassroots/advocacy organizations, if warranted. 1012 1011