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Reach Up Annual Report 2020 18 Elevate, an organization of Yale University, compiled the Goals and Needs Assessment Results as part of implementation for the Vermont MOMS Partnership™.

Major findings from this survey-based research include: • 97% of respondents indicated an interest in participating in the soon-to-launch Vermont MOMS Partnership™, showing a strong desire for mothers to improve their mental health status.

• The most common barriers mothers reported included transportation, childcare, ability to afford enough food and diapers, lack of social connection, and housing insecurity.

• Many of the above barriers are specifically associated with increased depressive symptoms in the mothers surveyed.

Section 6: Work Participation Rates and the Caseload Reduction Credit

States must submit quarterly data on all TANF recipients to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families (ACF). The work requirement for each family varies from 20 – 35 hours, depending on the age of the youngest child and whether it is a two-parent or single-parent family. Participants must fulfill those hours by taking part in federally approved “countable” activities. Those activities include paid employment, community service, limited hours of job search and readiness, and in a few cases, job training and education.18 ACF computes each state’s monthly Work Participation Rate for two categories: All Families and families with two parents in the Reach Up assistance group (Two-Parent Families). The rates are averaged over 12 months to calculate the state’s overall Work Participation Rate for the federal fiscal year. States are required to meet a 50% All-Family rate and a 90% Two-Parent Family rate.

Section 407(b)(3) of the Social Security Act, as amended by the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 (DRA), provides for an adjustment to a state’s fiscal year Work Participation Rate based on declines in the state’s caseload during the prior Federal Fiscal Year (FFY). This adjustment to the Work Participation Rate is called the state’s caseload reduction credit (CRC). The CRC gives states credit based on the actual reduction in the caseload between the statutory base year and the comparison year. The DRA changed the base year of the calculation from 1995 to 2005.

The chart below illustrates Vermont’s estimated participation rates as calculated, but not yet finalized, by the ACF:

TANF Work Participation Rates, Federal Fiscal Year 2018

All Families 2-Parent Families 1st quarter 47.1% 55.8% 2nd quarter 48.0% 57.4% 3rd quarter 46.5% 62.2% 4th quarter 43.6% 57.0% Average19 46.3% 58.1%

18 Further federal limitations on hours of participation and the age of participants in certain activities exist. 19 The Work Participation Rates are submitted quarterly to ACF, however the final calculations have not been finalized and released.