This week, the National Association of Counties (NACo) invited county officials to join a webinar on new federal funding opportunities. In addition, NACo is providing counties an opportunity to have their voices heard by two federal agencies in a call to action.

Webinar

Congress passed and the president signed the Fiscal Year 2018 omnibus bill which included the largest ever increase for the Child Care and Development Block Grant (CCDBG). In addition to CCDBG’s increase in funding, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services recently announced a new funding opportunity for states and localities – the Preschool Development Grant – which will help states and localities develop a mixed delivery system to serve children from birth through age five, and their families.

NACo will host a webinar on new funding opportunities for counties to strengthen early care and learning programs on September 19, 2018, at 11 AM PDT. This webinar is an opportunity for counties to learn how they can maximize these new resources. Shannon Christian, the Office of Child Care director from U.S Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families will be the speaker. You can register for the webinar online.

Call to Action

During NACo’s 2018 Annual Conference, representatives from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services joined the Human Services and Education Steering Committee meeting as guest speakers. To follow up on these conversations with Jessica Shahin (Associate Administrator for SNAP under USDA) and Shannon Christian (Director for the Office of Child Care under HHS), NACo staff has put together this questionnaire.

The questionnaire works to answer some of the outstanding questions both guest speakers and HSE Steering Committee members had for one another, recommendations the HSE Steering Committee members have for the guest speakers pertaining to communication and collaboration, and county best practices for federal human services programs.

The goal of the questionnaire is to strengthen communication and collaboration between the local and federal levels, educate our federal partners about on-the-ground experiences and identify paths for counties to work with federal partners to ensure federal programs are implemented in the most effective and efficient ways possible. To help NACo with their efforts to ensure the county voice is heard at the federal level, please coordinate within your county to respond to the questions listed in the questionnaire.

Please note that the questionnaire is two pages. Once you have responded to the questions in the spaces provided, please send them to ehurley@naco.org. Your responses will help educate the federal partners on how they can more effectively work with counties to ensure federal programs and services are meeting the needs of our residents.