Child Welfare Policy - Resources
Minnesota Resources
Primary Policy News Sources
Minnesota Legislature
Great place to search for existing statutes, laws, and rules. Also provides links to search for current bills in the House and Senate. Find out who represents you!
Minnesota House of Representatives
In particular, make sure to look out for:
- MyBills – Personalized bill tracking
- RSS Feeds & Podcasts – Includes Session Daily, Member News and Views (Representatives have their own RSS feeds for which you can sign up to receive)
- Email Updates – If you don’t use a feed reader
- House Session & Committee Schedule Upcoming Meetings– To see when bills are being heard and in which committees
- House Committee Information – Provides links to each committee’s home page, as well as the chair of the committee, member roster, and schedule.
Minnesota Senate
In particular, make sure to look out for:
- MyBills – Personalized bill tracking (same URL as the House)
- RSS Feeds – For individual Senators’ Press Release RSS Feeds
- Email Updates – If you don’t use a feed reader
- Senate Upcoming Meetings– To see when bills are being heard and in which committees
- Senate Committee Information – Provides links to committee descriptions & rosters, as well as an option to see legislative activity and subscribe to the email list
Minnesota Department of Human Services
The MN DHS website has policy information in its Children section, which includes child welfare. In addition, it provides “Related Pages” and “Related Links” to the right of each section, and these tend to include excellent resources and research. Finally, you can also check out the Publications tab, which has a way to subscribe to News from DHS as well as view and subscribe to Bulletins; to see bulletins specific to children and child welfare, just click on the year at the top of the left column.
Other Policy Sources
There are many organizations in Minnesota in addition to ours that focus on the wellbeing of children. Several of these organizations have excellent resources that are helpful in learning about child welfare policy; these include:
CASCW’s Child Welfare Policy blog
Make sure to follow the category “MN Legislature.” You can subscribe to an RSS feed of all entries, or customize it to track specific tags/categories.
Children’s Defense Fund–Minnesota
Although CDF-MN focuses on children as a whole, they do have a specific policy priority for child welfare.
Minnesota Social Service Association
One of their public policy statements is concerning child welfare policy and finance. Their 2011 Public Policy Agenda is very informative and includes specific policy solutions, as well as research to back up their arguments and the financial costs for their solutions.
Minnesota Fathers & Families Network
Their public policy tab includes News related to fathers and families and often includes child welfare-related policy news. They also have a great listing of public policy websites.
General Resources
Child Welfare Permanency & Legal Timelines (via Minnesota Judicial Branch)
National Resources
Primary Policy News Sources:
United States Senate
Includes links for Active Legislation (sorted alphabetically), the floor schedule, and Calendars & Schedules in general. Committees relevant to child welfare issues include:
- Indian Affairs,
- Judiciary,
- Homeland Security & Governmental Affairs,
- Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, with its Subcommittee on Children & Families
- Finance, with its Subcommittee on Social Security, Pensions, and Family Policy
- Budget, and
- Appropriations, with its Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies.
United States House of Representatives
The schedule for legislative activity is here. Committees relevant to child welfare issues include:
- Ways and Means, with its Subcommittee on Human Resources
- Budget,
- Judiciary, and
- Education & Workforce.
The White House Legislation page
Includes pending legislation (President may sign soon), signed legislation (now law), and vetoed legislation (not law).
THOMAS
The official bill tracking/search website.
GovTrack
Great place to track bills in the federal legislature. You can set up feeds and email alerts on specific topics, as well as subscribe to feeds for introduced and enacted bills.
Other Policy Sources
CASCW’s Child Welfare Policy blog
Make sure to follow the category “U.S. Legislature.” You can subscribe to an RSS feed of all entries, or customize it to track specific tags/categories.
CASCW’s Twitter list tracking Child Welfare Policy tweets
After carefully researching the Twitterverse, CASCW has created a list that tracks the tweets of individuals and organizations that regularly tweet about child welfare policy. This list will be carefully monitored and updated regularly to ensure that the tweets are consistently related to child welfare policy.
Jim Casey Youth Opportunities Initiative
This organization works to “raise awareness, identify policy needs, suggest promising practices and address systemic issues that impact young people aging out of foster care.” Their Policy page includes policy and practice goals.
Children’s Defense Fund–National
Provides resources on enacted legislation, as well as news related to child welfare policy and public policy priority areas.
Campaign for Children (First Focus)
This is First Focus’s legislative advocacy area. Has a bill tracker on bills related to children, as well as other advocacy tools such as a vote tracker and a “take action” tab.
National Indian Child Welfare Association
NICWA has a government affairs and advocacy webpage that includes action alerts, information on existing laws that pertain to Indian children, and pending legislative bills that have implications for Indian children.
Policy for Results
A website developed by CSSP, Policy for Results has a policy blog that is regularly updated on public policy issues, and policy resource pages for preventing child abuse and neglect, increasing exits from foster care to permanency, supporting youth transitioning from foster care, and strategies for tough fiscal times.
National Governors Association Center for Best Practices
“Develops innovative solutions to today’s most pressing public policy challenges.” They have resources on human services in general, but many of them include child welfare-related topics. Their policy position on child welfare services can be found here.
General Resources
State Child Welfare Policy Database
Child Welfare Information Gateway
Great information on research and information related to child welfare; this is necessary in order to support child welfare policy goals because research must inform policy changes.
Annie E. Casey Foundation
This organization provides grants to organizations which help to ensure the wellbeing of children in all communities.
First Focus
Bipartisan, works to ensure that children and families are a priority in federal policy & budget decisions. Has a special section on Child Welfare, Rights and Safety.
Fostering Connections
Provides implementation information for the Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act of 2008.
Child Trends
Lots of resources and information on child welfare topics.
Center for the Study of Social Policy
Works to improve the lives of the most vulnerable children and families through research and policy work. Has Policy Briefs, including one on child welfare, and a section called Policy Matters.
Chapin Hall at the University of Chicago
Chapin Hall provides policy research on child welfare and foster care systems.
