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Social
Services Consortium Members,
The House is working on putting together a budget and some information has
begun to trickle out. Currently, the budget cuts over $5.4Million dollars
to NC FAST. This was from the original cut that the Senate included but later
took out of their budget. This money is CRITICAL as these cuts will likely
devastate our ability to complete the project in a timely and cost effective
manner. Please be sure to contact the following Representatives to ask that
they NOT cut NC FAST using the talking points below.
Thanks!
Support Funding for NC FAST
We need to modernize the antiquated DSS Welfare Automation system to help
children and families and to meet federal requirements.
- The General Fiscal Research demands more information about the cost of the
various deliverables for the project. We will not know specific costs until
we receive responses to the Request for Proposal (RFP) which will be released
in July. We must exercise caution in publicizing our estimated costs for the
NCFAST initiative implementation. If not, vendor responses to the RFP could
include higher costs being submitted as part of their proposals. Cost estimates
provided for implementation include both projected vendor and state costs
to be incurred.
- Prior to posting an RFP with the intent of awarding a contract, we need
to have funding allocated for this initiative. If insufficient funding is
available for this initiative for the next biennium, we will either be unable
to move forward with the project or be forced to enter into a longer contractual
situation, which could in turn increase the overall project implementation
costs.
- Negotiations with our Federal Partners to provide funding for implementation
are underway. There have been two prior attempts in past years to move this
initiative forward and due to inadequate state funds and county buy-in, these
efforts resulted in failure. For the current NCFAST initiative, we have county
commitment and participation. If the state does not make it a priority to
move the current NCFAST initiative forward, then our Federal Partners will
likely not support this initiative moving forward. This could ultimately result
in a loss of Federal funding for implementation estimated to be in excess
of $22 million over the next biennium.
- NC FAST vastly benefits a multitude of programs and reduces the error in
data collection. NC FAST is being developed to assist in Work First, Food
Stamps, Child Welfare (CPS, Foster Care, Adoption, etc), Emergency Assistance,
Medicaid, NC Health Choice, Child Care Subsidy Program, Adult and Family Services,
Child Support. Currently, many of these programs require “pen and paper”
tracking and data tabulations by hand that increases the risk of errors. An
automated system reduces error and also allows more effective data collection
to meet federal accountability requirements.
- NC FAST effectively streamlines work to increase productivity. The mountains
of paperwork facing child welfare workers is astounding. Much time is spent
filling out forms that then have to be duplicated if the child moves to different
county. This is time lost that should be spent working directly with families.
- NC FAST allows statewide tracking of clients. In addition to the duplication
of work, we face a much graver problem of “losing” children in
the system. A child known to CPS in Wake County should be easily identified
in the computer in Buncombe County. Abuse or neglect of a child should not
be allowed to perpetuate simply by the inability to track a case from county
to county.
- NC FAST allows systems within DSS and their community service partners to
share information and in real time. In addition to tracking clients between
counties, this system would allow us to track clients across programs within
the DSS agency and with community service partners such as the schools and
mental health, thus sharing and improving communication that results in time
saved and better outcomes for clients.
