Human Services News

From: Public/Private Ventures:

P/PV is part of an initiative, sponsored by the federal Office of Family Assistance (OFA), to identify how TANF agencies and Faith-Based and Community Organizations can partner together to help low-income families find and retain employment.

The three major phases of this project will include:

* Research to create a compendium of promising practices;
* A pilot and technical assistance (TA) component to develop a model and work with jurisdictions to implement this model; and
* The development of a user-friendly toolkit, based on lessons learned, that can be used to guide future TANF/Faith-Based and Community Organization partnerships.

P/PV requests your assistance identifying promising partnerships and innovative programs. Specifically, we are requesting recommendations of Faith-Based and Community Organizations that have worked closely with local TANF agencies through either formal or informal arrangements to provide clients with employment preparation, placement and retention services, helping them to move toward self-sufficiency. We are particularly interested in TANF/Faith-Based and Community Organizations partnerships that:

* Have developed successful practices for referring families to Faith-Based and Community Organizations.
* Have developed successful practices for helping TANF participants overcome barriers to entering the labor market.
* Work closely together to assure clients receive the support necessary to sustain employment.
* Have developed and maintain good working relationships with employers.
* Have a history of meeting contractual goals for employment.

Selected TANF/Faith-Based and Community Organizations partnerships will be considered for inclusion in the compendium, inform the development of the pilot, potentially receive targeted TA and contribute to the toolkit.

If you have a partnership to recommend, please submit:

* The Faith-Based and Community Organization program name and contact information;
* A brief description of how the TANF agency and Faith-Based and Community Organization works together;
* What services the Faith-Based and Community Organization provides to TANF clients; and
* Why you believe the partnership is innovative.

Please submit to lkotloff@ppv.org by Thursday, February 28, 2008.