Family First Prevention Services Act
The Family First Prevention Services Act (FFPSA), signed into law on February 9, 2018, seeks to reform child welfare systems across the United States, primarily by reducing the number of children entering foster care. It emphasizes preventive services aimed at supporting families and keeping children safely with their biological parents whenever possible. The FFPSA allows states to access federal funding for services that can help families stay together, such as mental health support, substance abuse treatment, and parenting skills programs. In addition, it encourages kinship placements, where children are cared for by relatives, and aims to improve the quality of foster care by ensuring that foster parents are adequately trained and supported.
The act also limits the duration of stays in group facilities to promote better individual care for children and to minimize the use of such settings. Furthermore, it expands eligibility for aftercare services, extending support to young adults up to age twenty-three or twenty-six in certain cases. By focusing on preventive measures and the well-being of children, the FFPSA aims to create lasting positive changes in the child welfare system.
Family First Prevention Services Act
President Donald Trump signed the Family First Prevention Services Act (FFPSA) on February 9, 2018. The act was one part of the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018 and was written with the potential of changing child welfare systems throughout the United States. There are two key foci of FFPSA. First, the act seeks to reduce the overall number of children in foster care by funding child abuse prevention services and focusing on kinship fostering. Second, the act seeks to ensure that children who do enter foster care are placed in services that received (and continue to receive) advanced training and support services. A crucial goal is to keep children with their families whenever safe and possible.
Background
The Family First Prevention Services Act was one of multiple items that were a part of the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018. The signing of the act allowed for major changes to federal child welfare policy and afforded states opportunities to improve the lives of children, including teen parents. Providing families with the resources to become stronger family units and better serve their children is a key factor of FFPSA. One provision of the act allows for changes to how Title IV-E funds can be utilized by individual states. Title IV-E funding is a small but important component of federal child welfare contributions. Prior to the FFPSA, funding could only be used to help with foster care maintenance, administrative expenses and staff training, adoption assistance, and assistance for kinship guardianship. In the spirit of keeping families together, FFPSA allows federal support to fund preventative services that would help children who would be fostering candidates and their families stay together. Up to twelve months of prevention services could be reimbursed to the states, as long as they meet previously established requirements and benchmarks.
The FFPSA includes programs focusing on in-home parenting skills, mental health services, and substance abuse prevention and treatment services. Children or teens in kinship guardianship are also eligible for the funds. Any service or program offered must be labeled as either a promising practice, a supported practice, or a well-supported treatment. The labels are based largely on the length of continual success, starting with the shortest (or most recent) and ending with success beyond a year.
Recognizing that keeping children with their families is not always an option, FFPSA also emphasizes individual foster homes in the hopes of decreasing the prevalence of group care and/or facilities for children. Except for certain circumstances, the federal government will not reimburse states for children placed in group facilities for more than two weeks. Exceptions to the rule must follow strict guidelines, including child assessment within thirty days to see if a different environment would serve them better. Approved group settings are also typically limited to twelve-month stays. Among the group settings included within the twelve-month exception are those designed for pregnant or parenting youth, as well as supervised, independent living for those eighteen and older or those who are (or at risk of becoming) victims of sex trafficking. Any qualified residential treatment program (QRTP) must meet comprehensive requirements, including being accredited and having a trauma-informed model with appropriate staffing available twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.
The FFPSA outlined an implementation process from its 2018 passing through 2027. States were required to submit in 2019 their plans and documentation to prove their existing licensing standards met the new requirements. No later than December 31, 2025, the Government Accountability Office was required to submit to Congress research detailing the impact on the juvenile justice system and the new implications of federal reimbursements for children not in foster families. Reimbursement based on the Federal Medical Assistance Percentage was scheduled to begin September 30, 2026, for those prevention services that proved promising, supported, or well-supported. Complete implementation of the Family First Prevention Services Act was scheduled for October 1, 2027, when states must have an electronic processing system for the exchange of data regarding foster care, adoption, and guardianship. By the close of 2024, Family First bills and resolutions had been enacted in twenty-nine states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico.
Topic Today
Discussion of the Family First Prevention Services Act frequently addresses its immediate impact on the state’s handling of government assistance programs; however, the potential long-term impact on the children involved is critical. Although a key goal is to provide preventative services and education to keep children with their biological families, the safety of the children is paramount. Thus, foster parents play a critical role. Similarly, as the use of group facilities decreases, the need for foster parents increases, particularly for those foster parents equipped to handle unique situations. Another goal is establishing more kinship placements by designing programs that help relatives create a healthy and positive environment for children. Once such programs are administered, the length of foster stays would ideally be shorter and, when possible, help promote reunification with a child’s biological family. With biological family reunification as an end goal, there is also an emphasis on establishing meaningful connections between foster and biological families to ease future transitions. Independent living services, also called aftercare, are included within the FFPSA. Aftercare services may be extended to those up to age twenty-three, a two-year increase from the previous cap of twenty-one years old. Education and Training Vouchers could also be extended to those under twenty-six. Previously, eligibility stopped at age twenty-three.
Bibliography
"About the Law." Family First Act, familyfirstact.org/about-law. Accessed 1 Jan. 2025.
“Child Welfare and FFPSA.” Alliance for Early Success, earlysuccess.org/child-welfare-and-ffpsa. Accessed 1 Jan. 2025.
“Fact Sheet: Family First Prevention Services Act: An Opportunity to Redefine Pennsylvania’s Child Welfare Practices.” Pennsylvania Partnerships for Children, May 2019, www.papartnerships.org/report/fact-sheet-family-first-prevention-services-act-an-opportunity-to-redefine-pennsylvanias-child-welfare-practices-may-2019. Accessed 1 Jan. 2025.
“Family First Prevention Services Act.” National Conference of State Legislatures, 26 Apr. 2022, www.ncsl.org/human-services/family-first-prevention-services-act. Accessed 1 Jan. 2025.
"Summary Family First State Plans and Enacted Legislation." National Conference of State Legislatures, 16 Oct. 2024, www.ncsl.org/human-services/family-first-state-plans-and-enacted-legislation. Accessed 1 Jan. 2025.
“Understanding the Impact of the Family First Prevention Services Act on Foster Care.” Fairfax County, Sept. 2021, www.fairfaxcounty.gov/familyservices/community-corner/understanding-the-impact-of-the-family-first-prevention-services-act-on-foster-care. Accessed 1 Jan. 2025.
Vivrette, Rebecca, et al. "Using the Family First Act to Grow and Nurture Support Systems for Families of Young Children." Child Trends, 11 Oct. 2023, www.childtrends.org/publications/using-the-family-first-act-to-grow-and-nurture-support-systems-for-families-of-young-children. Accessed 1 Jan. 2025.
Waid, Jeffrey, and Mimi Choy-Brown. “Moving Upstream: The Family First Prevention Services Act and Re-Imagining Opportunities for Prevention in Child Welfare Practice.” Children and Youth Services Review, vol. 127, 2021, doi.org/10.1016/j.childyouth.2021.106098. Accessed 1 Jan. 2025.