Page 29

State of New Hampshire

TANF State Plan

28 New Hampshire State Plan Effective October 2023 Cliff Effect Initiative

The HB4 working group began meeting in November 2019 to develop recommendations to address the cliff effect. The first step towards the development of recommendations was to conduct a comprehensive economic analysis. The analysis was led by New Hampshire Employment Security (NHES) in partnership with the Department. This analysis began in December 2019 and was underway when the COVID-19 pandemic came upon New Hampshire. Instead of pausing the work or cutting it short, the work was expanded to include areas significantly impacted by the pandemic, such as unemployment and the availability of child care across the state. While this extended the timeline for the work, it provided valuable, additional data for the development of this plan to strengthen New Hampshire’s families, economy, and communities.

Econsult presented the analysis on March 22, 2021. From this, five workgroups were established: Food and Income Security, Transportation, Workforce, Housing, and Child Care. A member of the Whole Families Chapter and a Department program person co-led these groups; their charge was to review and analyze the recommendations and present their findings. The groups presented to the HB 4 Working Group on June 21 and 29, 2021.

What follows are the TANF recommendations that the HB4 working group and DHHS senior management decided to move forward with:

• Changes to Earned Income Disregard. Participants are eligible for a 75% TANF earned income disregard when starting a new full-time position or current employment increase to full time. For those working in jobs on the high demand list (generated by the New Hampshire Workforce Innovation Opportunities Act board) and medical benefits are offered, are eligible for a 100% disregard during the two-year pilot. The pilot was implemented in September 2022. This encourages participants to work, take promotions, increase work hours, and take higher paying jobs while keeping more income for their household. This will help mitigate the challenge of an individual facing a choice of work advancement that will result in a net loss for the household or forgoing the advancement opportunity to keep their benefits. • Adjustment to the TANF child care deduction age bands from age 0-2 for under school age to 0-6 & school age from age 2+ to age 6+. This will assist with the benefits cliff as it will enable families with children under age 6, who tend to incur higher child care costs, to receive a higher deduction in their TANF budget which results in a higher TANF grant. Adoption of the rule amendments occurred in June of 2023. • Increase resource limit for TANF recipients from $2,000 to $5,000. This will allow families the ability to save additional funds that can be utilized for higher priced items such as a down payment on a new apartment or a car. Adoption of the rule amendments occurred in May of 2023. • Post TANF Employment Program. This voluntary program will provide services to individuals that were participating in the NHEP, for one year after NHEP closure due to TANF cash closure, to create a safety net to reduce recidivism. The Post TANF Employment Program will utilize TANF funding. The purpose of the program is to provide guidance and employment counseling to assist with employment retention, as well as provide support and assistance in the event of job loss and to aid in securing new employment. The Post TANF Employment Program focus is also to assist with upward mobility within the existing company and/or through shifting employment to another company. In addition, ETS services will be available to provide assistance that might