[House Hearing, 112 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
NO-COST IMPROVEMENTS TO CHILD SUPPORT
ENFORCEMENT
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON HUMAN RESOURCES
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON WAYS AND MEANS
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
MARCH 20, 2012
__________
Serial No. 112-HR10
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Ways and Means
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COMMITTEE ON WAYS AND MEANS
DAVE CAMP, Michigan, Chairman
WALLY HERGER, California SANDER M. LEVIN, Michigan
SAM JOHNSON, Texas CHARLES B. RANGEL, New York
KEVIN BRADY, Texas FORTNEY PETE STARK, California
PAUL RYAN, Wisconsin JIM MCDERMOTT, Washington
DEVIN NUNES, California JOHN LEWIS, Georgia
PATRICK J. TIBERI, Ohio RICHARD E. NEAL, Massachusetts
GEOFF DAVIS, Kentucky XAVIER BECERRA, California
DAVID G. REICHERT, Washington LLOYD DOGGETT, Texas
CHARLES W. BOUSTANY, JR., Louisiana MIKE THOMPSON, California
PETER J. ROSKAM, Illinois JOHN B. LARSON, Connecticut
JIM GERLACH, Pennsylvania EARL BLUMENAUER, Oregon
TOM PRICE, Georgia RON KIND, Wisconsin
VERN BUCHANAN, Florida BILL PASCRELL, JR., New Jersey
ADRIAN SMITH, Nebraska SHELLEY BERKLEY, Nevada
AARON SCHOCK, Illinois JOSEPH CROWLEY, New York
LYNN JENKINS, Kansas
ERIK PAULSEN, Minnesota
KENNY MARCHANT, Texas
RICK BERG, North Dakota
DIANE BLACK, Tennessee
TOM REED, New York
Jennifer M. Safavian, Staff Director and General Counsel
Janice Mays, Minority Chief Counsel
______
SUBCOMMITTEE ON HUMAN RESOURCES
GEOFF DAVIS, Kentucky, Chairman
ERIK PAULSEN, Minnesota LLOYD DOGGETT, Texas
RICK BERG, North Dakota JIM MCDERMOTT, Washington
TOM REED, New York JOHN LEWIS, Georgia
TOM PRICE, Georgia JOSEPH CROWLEY, New York
DIANE BLACK, Tennessee
CHARLES W. BOUSTANY, JR., Louisiana
C O N T E N T S
__________
Page
Advisory of March 20, 2012 announcing the hearing................ 2
WITNESSES
S. Kay Farley, Executive Director, National Center for State
Courts......................................................... 6
Marilyn Stephen, Director, Office of Child Support, Michigan
Department of Human Services................................... 18
Craig Burlingame, Chief Information Officer, Trial Court
Information Services, Massachusetts Court System............... 23
Gordon Berlin, President, MDRC................................... 34
SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD
Eastern Regional Interstate Child Support Association............ 47
NO-COST IMPROVEMENTS TO CHILD
SUPPORT ENFORCEMENT
----------
TUESDAY, MARCH 20, 2012
U.S. House of Representatives,
Committee on Ways and Means,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:01 p.m., in
Room 1100, Longworth House Office Building, the Honorable Geoff
Davis [chairman of the subcommittee] presiding.
[The advisory of the hearing follows:]
HEARING ADVISORY
Chairman Davis Announces Hearing on No-Cost Improvements to Child
Support Enforcement
Washington, Mar, 2012
Congressman Geoff Davis (R-KY), Chairman of the Subcommittee on
Human Resources of the Committee on Ways and Means, announced today
that the Subcommittee will hold a hearing on no-cost improvements to
the child support enforcement (CSE) program. The hearing will take
place on Tuesday, March 20, 2012 in 1100 Longworth House Office
Building, beginning at 2:00 P.M.
In view of the limited time available to hear witnesses, oral
testimony at this hearing will be from invited witnesses only.
Witnesses will include state child support enforcement officials and
other experts. However, any individual or organization not scheduled
for an oral appearance may submit a written statement for consideration
by the Committee and for inclusion in the printed record of the
hearing.
BACKGROUND:
The CSE program was created in 1975 in order to reduce public
expenditures on welfare by obtaining support from noncustodial parents
on an ongoing basis and to help non-welfare families get support so
they could stay off public assistance. Today, this State-administered
program has grown to serve all families that request services and is
estimated to handle 50 to 60 percent of all child support cases. States
and Territories receive over $4 billion annually in Federal
administrative funds, which covers approximately two-thirds of the
total cost of operating the CSE program. In FY 2010, the CSE program
collected $26.6 billion in child support payments and served nearly
15.9 million child support cases. However, the program collects only 62
percent of current child support obligations for which it has
responsibility.
In 2007, the United States was party to the Hague Convention on the
International Recovery of Child Support and Other Forms of Family
Maintenance. The Hague Convention aims to increase cooperation among
nations for the international recovery of child support and other forms
of family assistance. In order for the United States to fully ratify
the Convention, Congress must approve and the President must sign
implementing legislation that would amend Title IV-D of the Social
Security Act and require States to update their child support laws by
adopting amendments to the Uniform Interstate Family Support Act
(UIFSA). This implementing legislation, which is designed to improve
child support recovered in international cases, is expected to result
in no additional State or Federal program costs.
Beyond the Hague Convention, other no-cost improvements to the CSE
program expected to be reviewed in the hearing include improving data
and information exchange among state courts and human services
organizations, as well as expanding researcher access to the National
Directory of New Hires (a database under the authority of the CSE
program) in order to improve the evaluation of employment programs.
In announcing the hearing, Chairman Geoff Davis (R-KY) stated,
``Ratification of the Hague Convention will mean that more children
living in the United States will receive the financial support they
deserve, even when one parent lives in another country. In addition,
given the number of agencies involved in this issue, it is critical for
technology to keep pace so families receive the support they need. This
hearing will review several simple, no-cost ways of improving child
support programs to achieve those goals, which I am hopeful Congress
will pass in the near future.''
FOCUS OF THE HEARING:
The hearing will focus on the implementing legislation for the
Hague Convention on the International Recovery of Child Support and
Other Forms of Family Maintenance and related CSE improvements.
DETAILS FOR SUBMISSION OF WRITTEN COMMENTS:
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Note: All Committee advisories and news releases are available on
the World Wide Web at http://www.waysandmeans.house.gov/.
Chairman DAVIS. Thank you for joining us today. Today we
are going to review several no-cost ways to improve the
Nation's child support enforcement program so more children can
benefit from child support. These changes should have broad
bipartisan support and hopefully can proceed to the House floor
in the coming weeks.
The child support enforcement program was created in 1975
in order to reduce public expenditures on welfare. By obtaining
support from non-custodial parents on an ongoing basis and
helping non-welfare families get support, more families could
stay off public assistance.
Today this State-administered program has grown to serve
all families that request services, and is estimated to handle
60 percent of all child support cases. It results in $26.6
billion in child support collections involving 15.9 million
unique cases.
To carry out this work, States and Territories receive over
$4 billion annually in Federal administrative funds, which
covers approximately two-thirds of the total cost of the
operating system. With the help of the experts who will testify
today, we will review several no-cost ways to improve the child
support enforcement program, increase child support
collections, and better serve both families and taxpayers.
One way to increase collections and ensure that more
children living in the United States receive the financial
support they deserve is through ratification of the Hague
Convention on the International Recovery of Child Support and
Other Forms of Family Maintenance. That is a mouthful, but it
really boils down to stepped-up efforts to collect support when
one parent lives outside of the United States.
Before our subcommittee is the implementing legislation for
the Hague Convention, which has bipartisan support, would have
no cost for taxpayers, and is expected to increase collections
in such cases. That will both help more children and reduce the
need for taxpayer support in the form of welfare checks.
Another way to increase collections is to increase the
subcommittee's bipartisan efforts to standardize data and
improve the exchange of data within and across programs. The
child support system already heavily relies on data exchanges,
but it is important for those efforts to be consistent with our
data standardization progress involving child welfare, TANF,
and unemployment programs so we can improve the overall
efficiency of government programs.
Continuing on the data exchange theme, we will also
consider an Administration proposal to allow researchers access
to data in the National Directory of New Hires, a database
maintained by the child support enforcement program. This will
help in evaluating whether employment programs are working as
intended.
This is a classic example of what we hope will happen as we
increase the exchange of data; we can use the data we already
have in smarter ways to help evaluate and improve government
programs so they work better for intended recipients and
taxpayers alike.
We look forward to all of the testimony today. And we also
look forward to working with our colleagues to improve how this
program serves the children and families who depend on it, as
well as ensuring it efficiently and effectively uses taxpayer
dollars.
Before we move on to our testimony, I want to remind our
witnesses to limit their oral arguments to five minutes.
However, without objection, all of the written testimony will
be made part of the permanent record.
On our panel this afternoon, we will be hearing from Kay
Farley, Executive Director of the National Center for State
Courts; and to introduce Marilyn Stephen, the director of the
Office of Child Support in the Michigan Department of Human
Services, I would like to recognize the chairman of the full
committee, Mr. Camp, who shares a home state with Ms. Stephen.
And now I would like to recognize our full committee
ranking member--Mr. Levin is not here.
I would like to recognize Chairman Camp to say a few words.
Chairman CAMP. Alright. Well, thank you, Chairman Davis.
And again, I would like to welcome Marilyn Stephen, director of
the Michigan Office of Child Support, to the hearing today.
Marilyn has served as director of the Office of Child
Support since 2002 after having been an assistant prosecuting
attorney in the child support division of the Office of the
Prosecuting Attorney in Jackson, Michigan for several years.
And as a proud resident of Michigan myself, I want to thank
Marilyn for her many years of service to our great state.
I would also like to take this opportunity to recognize the
efforts of the Michigan Department of Human Services, which
includes the Office of Child Support, under the leadership of
Maura Corrigan and Brian Rooney. As a former State Supreme
Court Justice and the current director of the Michigan
Department of Human Services, Maura Corrigan has worked
tirelessly to ensure the well-being of children in Michigan.
I want to specifically highlight her work in child support
enforcement, particularly to increase collections. Through her
efforts, Maura has focused on the broad strategies of
prevention, collaboration, and enforcement as a way to address
the challenges and consequences of an underground economy.
And finally, I would like to mention Brian Rooney, who is
the brother of Florida Congressman Tom Rooney and deputy
director of the Michigan Department of Human Services. I want
to thank him both for his past service in the Iraq War and
present service to our State as deputy director, where he is
not afraid to ask the hard questions and make sure that kids
are first.
We are certainly lucky to have three such outstanding
individuals working for the residents of the State of Michigan,
and we are honored to have Ms. Stephen before the committee
today to testify about improving child support enforcement
programs and drawing on her extensive experience in Michigan.
So thank you, Chairman Davis, and I yield back.
Chairman DAVIS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Also, we have with us Craig Burlingame, the chief
information officer with Trial Court Information Services in
the Massachusetts Court System; and Gordon Berlin, president of
MDRC.
I would now like to recognize my good friend, Mr. Lewis
from Georgia, representing Ranking Member Doggett today.
Mr. LEWIS. Thank you very much, Chairman Davis. Thank you
for calling this bipartisan hearing. As you know, unfortunately
Ranking Member Doggett is not able to attend today's hearing
because his flight into D.C. was canceled due to storms. I
would like to applaud you both for coming together yet again to
address pressing issues before the subcommittee.
We all know that a parent's responsibility to his or her
children does not end at our borders. That is why States seek
an agreement with other countries to collect child support from
non-custodial parents. Unfortunately, this State-by-State
approach leaves out many States, and the different legal
procedures and standards can be costly and create loopholes and
confusion.
A better approach would be for the United States as a whole
to enter into a broader convention or treaty to ensure the
international collection of child support. This way, we can
move away from the piecemeal process and get everyone on the
same page. I hope today's discussion will guide us in the right
direction.
Hopefully, we can craft bipartisan legislation that would
ensure our child support system can fully comply with such a
treaty. This will lead to more children getting the financial
support they need and deserve.
Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Doggett and I look forward to
continuing to work with you and other subcommittee members as
we move forward with this important piece of legislation. Thank
you very much again, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman DAVIS. Thank you, Mr. Lewis.
And with that, one vote has been called. We are going to
temporarily recess the hearing for about 15 minutes, and then
we will be back to pick up with the testimony of the witnesses
and questions.
[Recess.]
Chairman DAVIS. We will go ahead and reconvene the hearing
now. Thank you again for your flexibility and patience.
We are going to go ahead and begin with witness testimony.
Ms. Farley, you may proceed with your testimony. And again, I
would just remind the witnesses that we would ask you to keep
it to five minutes, and that will allow more time for
questioning by the members afterwards.
Proceed.
STATEMENT OF S. KAY FARLEY, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, NATIONAL CENTER
FOR STATE COURTS
Ms. FARLEY. Chairman Davis and Members of the Subcommittee,
thank you for the opportunity to testify today regarding
implementation of the Hague Convention on International
Recovery of Child Support and Other Forms of Family
Maintenance. I am speaking today on behalf of the National
Child Support Enforcement Association, and NCSEA thanks you for
holding this hearing.
International child support enforcement is increasingly
more common and important in our global society. By way of
background, the U.S. has not joined the two prior child support
treaties because of fundamental differences in how jurisdiction
is obtained over parties in child support matters.
Unlike the U.S., other countries do not require due process
protection sufficient to meet the U.S. constitutional
standards. The U.S. has dealt with international cases by
negotiating bilateral agreements with individual countries.
While these bilateral agreements have been beneficial,
procedures and forms vary from country to country.
The Hague Conference on Private International Law
established a special commission in 2003 to develop a new child
support treaty, which would modernize the existing system and
encourage global adoption. This effort offered the opportunity
to craft a new treaty to which the U.S. could participate.
The objective of the Convention is to ensure effective
international recovery of child support. The Convention creates
four main measures to achieve that objective: establishing a
comprehensive system of cooperation between the participating
countries; making applications available for the establishment
of parentage and child support matters; providing for
recognition and enforcement of foreign support orders; and
requiring effective measures for prompt enforcement of foreign
support orders.
The Convention should result in more children receiving the
financial support they need from their parents, regardless of
where their parents live. While the U.S. courts and child
support agencies already recognize and enforce most foreign
child support orders, other countries have not recognized and
enforced our orders. They will have to do so once they and the
U.S. ratify the Convention.
The Convention's procedures are similar to those procedures
already in place for processing interstate cases in the United
States. Many of the provisions of the Convention are drawn from
the U.S. experience with the Uniform Interstate Family Support
Act, or UIFSA. The Convention will not affect the handling of
our domestic child support cases; it will only apply to cases
where the custodial parent and child live in one country, and
the non-custodial parent lives in another.
International child support cases will be processed under
existing U.S. Federal and State law and practice. Compliance
with the obligations under the Convention will require minimal
changes to the U.S. law. My written testimony provides
information on key provisions to the Convention. You will note
that for all of these provisions, they are consistent with
current policy and practice in the U.S.
Let me briefly talk about how the Convention would be
implemented in the U.S. The Uniform Law Commission developed
and approved the 2008 UIFSA amendments to comply with the terms
of the Convention. The intent is for Congress to require States
to adopt these amendments verbatim or lose Federal funding.
The 2008 amendments were limited only to those changes
required to comply with the Convention. Existing Articles 1
through 6 were modified to include foreign support orders,
where procedures handling Convention cases would be the same as
for handling domestic cases. The amendments do include a new
Article 7, which will apply only to international cases and
address those requirements unique to the Convention.
Let me turn now to why the U.S. should implement the
Convention. In a world where an increasing number of U.S.
children have a parent living abroad, this Convention is needed
so that all children will receive the child support that is so
vital to their financial well-being.
The Convention resolves the jurisdictional barriers that
prevented the U.S. from joining the prior child support
treaties. The Convention offers the U.S. the opportunity to
join a multilateral treaty, saving the time and expense that
would be otherwise required to negotiate individual bilateral
agreements with countries.
The Convention provides a structure and uniform procedures
to increase the efficiency and effectiveness in processing
international cases. And, lastly, the Convention provides for
access to cost-free or low-cost services for legal assistance
to U.S. custodial parents.
NCSEA expressed its strong support for the Convention in a
resolution which was adopted in August 2008. I also want to
advise you that the Convention has widespread support from
State organizations such as the Conference of Chief Justices,
the Conference of State Court Administrators, the Uniform Law
Commission, and the American Bar Association.
Thank you for the opportunity to present this testimony and
for your consideration of our recommendations. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Farley follows:]
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Chairman DAVIS. Thank you, Ms. Farley.
Ms. Stephen, please proceed.
STATEMENT OF MARILYN STEPHEN, DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF CHILD
SUPPORT, MICHIGAN DEPARTMENT OF HUMAN SERVICES
Ms. STEPHEN. Thank you very much, Chairman Davis and
Members of the Subcommittee, for this opportunity. As you know,
I am the director of the Michigan Office of Child Support, but
I am speaking to you today on behalf of the many child support
professionals across the country who are members of National
Child Support Enforcement Association.
Michigan passed the first child support law in 1919 to
permit local governments to assure support for the children in
their communities. The drafters of that law would never have
dreamt that in 2012, there would be 750,000 court-ordered child
support cases in Michigan, and that one in three children would
be spending a part of their childhood living with only one
parent.
Those same drafters would not have recognized a world where
something oddly named a tweet can circle the globe in seconds,
and American citizens can travel thousands of miles from home
in just a few hours.
In the last 60 years, it has become commonplace for parents
and families to move from state to state. In many ways, the
child support programs kept pace with these changes in society.
First, Congress required States to enact the Uniform Reciprocal
Enforcement of Support Act in the 1950s that set some ground
rules for assuring financial support for children no matter
where in the country the parent lived.
As the migration of families across the country continued
and child support programs in the State swelled, problems arose
with the processing of interstate cases that finally
precipitated a complete redesign in the 1990s, resulting in the
Uniform Interstate Family Support Act. This law has been a
great success in helping States to provide coordinated services
consistently and efficiently to ensure that children receive
the support that they need.
Now we are on the verge of the next big step forward with
the Hague Convention and implementing legislation that we are
discussing today. To help you understand how important this
step is to the States, I would like to tell you a little about
the problems we face in trying to assure support for the
children of Americans around the world.
There are basic issues related to the translation of
documents and currency exchange rates. But there are also
fundamental differences in processes, jurisdictional
understandings, the services provided in different countries,
and even the basic definitions of who will be served.
My front-line staff in Michigan report constant issues with
trying to locate parents in other countries that owe child
support; concerns about how notice to that parent, or what we
in this country would call due process or even service of
process, is accomplished; and the amount of time it takes to
start support payments flowing to the parent who is raising the
child.
It is commonplace to hear that families have had to wait
five years or more for a support obligation to be established,
and this is with countries that we have agreed to work with
through bilateral agreements. To me, the bilateral agreements
are analogous to the old interstate laws of the 1950s. They are
certainly better than nothing, but they do not establish any
rules or mutual understandings about the work that needs to be
done or the goals that should be accomplished.
When our workers attempt to coordinate with officials in
countries where we lack bilateral agreements, we generally
receive no response whatsoever, or we are instructed to hire a
lawyer in that country. Because most parents cannot afford to
go down that path, the child support case ends up being closed
until the support obligor leaves the safe haven of that
country. The Hague Convention would fix this problem by
requiring free services in most instances.
In Michigan, we estimate that we have between 4- and 5,000
cases where a parent lives in another country. That includes
more than a thousand cases with Canada, with whom we share a
700-mile border. International cases can be challenging and
very time-consuming for workers because there are no agreed-
upon standard proofs, forms, or methods of communication. For
this reason, I believe adoption of the Hague Convention and the
enabling legislation would actually result in a cost savings to
the States.
Earlier I called this a big step. But all the States
understand that we will not see instant benefits from these
improvements. We also know with certainty that not moving down
this road to international cooperation will likely mean that
more American children will lack the basic support that every
parent should provide, and that more obligors will seek out
those safe havens. Simply put, children need the support of
both parents no matter where in the world their lives take
them.
Thank you very much for your consideration of this
important children's issue.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Stephen follows:]
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Chairman DAVIS. Thank you very much, Ms. Stephen.
Mr. Burlingame, you can give your testimony.
STATEMENT OF CRAIG D. BURLINGAME, CHIEF INFORMATION OFFICER,
TRIAL COURT INFORMATION SERVICES, MASSACHUSETTS COURT SYSTEM
Mr. BURLINGAME. Thank you, Chairman Davis, Members of the
Subcommittee. Thank you for the opportunity to testify on the
important issue of technology standards in child support
enforcement. My name is Craig Burlingame, and I am the chief
information officer for the Massachusetts Trial Court. I
testify today with over 30 years of information technology
experience in State and local government.
In addition to my day job, I have the privilege of serving
as the chairman of the Court Information Technology Officers
Consortium, or CITOC. CITOC is a national organization of
technology professionals in courts, with active members in over
40 States. CITOC provides our members with a forum through
which we can exchange information, ideas, and share our
collective experiences.
Throughout my career, I have had the chance to observe the
benefits that can be realized from the implementation of
technology standards like those I believe are contemplated by
your legislation. Good standards establish a technological
vocabulary that allow various parties with different
perspectives to speak in the same language when discussing
electronic information and data exchange.
Further, the existence of quality standards provide a level
playing field for the vendors that provide software and
services to government entities that choose to use them. If a
vendor is asked to implement a system in adherence to
referenced standards, some of the uncertainty that exists in
government procurements can be eliminated or at least reduced.
As importantly, once a vendor has implemented a system in
compliance with standards, the effort needed for subsequent
implementations is reduced, preventing agency after agency from
having to pay for customized systems, at least in those areas
that are covered by the standards.
One need look no further than public safety for
longstanding examples of where standards have established a
vocabulary to the benefit of taxpayers. Both with the FBI's
NCIC system and the National Law Enforcement Telecommunications
System, or NLETS, States and municipalities have been able to
exchange information using standards for decades with these
systems. In both of these cases, a vibrant and robust vendor
community sells software and hardware solutions to criminal
justice agencies nationwide that interoperate with NCIC and
NLETS.
When an agency purchases a system, they need only indicate
to a prospective vendor the nature of the business they wish to
transact and reference the applicable standards. In the case of
the court community, the OASIS Electronic Court Filing standard
has been evolving since it was first developed in 2001.
In its most recent version, the ECF standard covers not
only court filings but the electronic service of parties, and
encompasses a variety of case types. This standard, which is
now being used by courts and vendors in jurisdictions
throughout the country, has been updated in its most recent
version for compliance with NIEM, the National Information
Exchange Model, which is contemplated by your legislation as
well. When the Commonwealth recently issued an RFI for
electronic filing, in our conversation with prospective vendors
we were able to talk to them about how we expected the software
to use ECF standards to transact business with our established
case management system. Most vendors selling electronic filing
products today understand exactly what that means and what is
necessary for their software to use these standards.
And, as importantly, many of the vendors in the e-filing
space have already built the software needed to interface with
existing systems using ECF standards. As a result of this, the
cost to implement such interfaces is minimal compared to the
cost of developing customized solutions from scratch.
Although I am not testifying today on behalf of NIEM, I
certainly am testifying in support of NIEM. The NIEM model is
now being used in many aspects of government around the
country, and not just within the justice community. As you may
know, NIEM currently has 12 different domains, including
children, youth, and family services.
Because we in the courts deal with matters that come before
us from a wide range of other governmental agencies and areas,
we would hope that any standards developed in the child support
enforcement area would be developed using the NIEM framework. I
have included in my written testimony a few examples of where
NIEM is being used successfully in the court community today,
as well as information on what we are doing in Massachusetts.
In conclusion, I believe the legislation that you are
contemplating today is helpful and important, and I would
encourage the committee to continue to advocate for the use of
technology standards in the future. Such standards can reduce
the cost of systems and increase the likelihood of
interoperability among systems. The use of technology standards
can indeed establish a common vocabulary for all to use in
facilitating good and efficient government. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Burlingame follows:]
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Chairman DAVIS. Thank you very much, Mr. Burlingame.
Mr. Berlin.
STATEMENT OF GORDON L. BERLIN, PRESIDENT, MDRC
Mr. BERLIN. Chairman Davis and Members of the Subcommittee,
thank you for the invitation to testify today. My remarks focus
on the research uses of the National Directory of New Hires
database.
Every year, often at the direction of Congress, Federal
agencies contract with independent research organizations to
conduct evaluations of the effectiveness of government
programs. In nearly every case, a key measure of effectiveness
is the program's long-term effects on participants' employment
and earnings.
One of the most reliable sources of earnings and employment
data is collected by States from employers as part of the
administration of the unemployment insurance system. Currently,
an evaluator acting as an agent of the Federal Government must
obtain these data from each State agency. Because evaluations
of governmental programs take place in multiple jurisdictions,
the evaluator must spend considerable resources to ascertain
the State's requirements for data acquisition and then apply
separately to each State for the data.
The significant costs of data acquisition efforts are
passed on to the Federal agency and, ultimately, to taxpayers.
It is an unnecessary expense.
The same data that Federal contract evaluators must
painstakingly acquire from each state already resides in a
Federal database, the National Directory of New Hires, which
Congress created to aid in the support of the administration of
the Child Support Enforcement System.
However, due to restrictions currently placed on access to
this database, many federally supported researchers and
evaluators are unable to access employment and earnings data
from this database.
Instead, they are forced to get the very same data directly
from the states at great cost to the Federal Government, and at
considerable burden in duplicative reporting for the states.
If the New Hire's database were made available to
evaluators with appropriate privacy safeguards, it would enable
Congress and the agencies to assess the impact that social
programs have on jobs and earnings at much lower cost and less
burden to the Federal Government and the states.
The proposed amendment to Part D of Title 4 of the Social
Security Act would advance the objective of making this
database available for a broader range of research purposes.
But, there are three areas where the amendment could be
strengthened. First, there may still be some ambiguity about
whether a Federal agency can provide individual level data with
personal identifiers to a contract or grant funded evaluator,
and thus, the procedures put in place could result in Federal
agents creating data sharing systems that are more complex and
more costly than necessary.
However, I want to hasten to add that these systems would
still be superior to the current situation which has
contractors going to individual states to recreate over and
over again a dataset that already exists at the Federal level.
My suggestion is that the bill clearly authorize the
release of personally identifiable employment and earnings data
directly to entities conducting Federal program evaluations,
providing that all of the necessary procedures are in place to
protect an individual's privacy and the confidentiality of the
data.
Second, the proposed amendment appears to require that a
separate agreement be concluded between OCSE and the Federal
agency requesting the data for each and every study.
Here, the amendment might allow for more inclusive blanket
data agreements between agencies, avoiding the need to
negotiate separate interagency agreements for every study.
Third, the bill should be careful to enumerate all the
relevant Federal agencies. For example, the Department of
Defense and the Corporation for National Service, both of which
fund research and evaluation studies, are missing from the
current draft.
Lastly, I want to briefly mention three potential concerns
regarding the amendment.
First, protecting the data's confidentiality. I want to
stress that research contractors acting as the Federal
Government's agent obtain the same earnings and employment
information now from states. In doing so, they assume
responsibility for protecting the privacy of the data, and the
confidentiality of the individuals involved, using secure
servers, encryption, and other best practices as required by
each individual state, and the standards of each state vary
greatly.
The proposed amendment would standardize and thus
strengthen those requirements and protections, and it would add
felony level penalties for a willful breach of privacy laws.
You would essentially be strengthening the privacy protections.
Cost is another major issue. Federal contracts and grants
include funding to obtain the data from states now. These same
contracts should instead include funding to cover the marginal
cost of obtaining the data from the federal agency that
administers the NDNH database.
Those costs would certainly be less expensive than the
costs currently incurred.
Finally, it is not precedent setting. The Federal
Government provides a range of confidential sensitive data to
research contractors and grantees acting as Federal agents now.
In conclusion, this relatively simple fix to existing law
governing the New Hire's database, giving researchers
evaluating Federal programs access to personally identifiable
employment and earnings' information would eliminate
unnecessary duplicative data collection efforts, and reduce
reporting burdens on state governments.
It would also save Federal and state taxpayers money, and
improve the quality and the efficiency of federally supported
evaluation research, all while strengthening the protections
governing the confidentiality of the data, and further
protecting the privacy of individuals.
Thank you very much.
[The prepared information of Mr. Berlin follows:]
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Chairman DAVIS. Thank you very much, Mr. Berlin. We are
going to move to questions now.
I have a more general question for all of the witnesses.
Each of you has had an opportunity to review a draft of the
proposed legislation, of the proposals we have been discussing
so far today, and many of you have alluded to it in your
testimony.
I was wondering if you have any additional comments about
the draft legislation, specifically anything that you believe
should be changed or improved upon as we move forward.
I would open it up for any of the witnesses to share.
Mr. Burlingame.
Mr. BURLINGAME. Mr. Chairman, the one thing I would point
out, in talking to some of my colleagues in states around the
country, I was surprised to learn that in many instances today,
judges and individuals supervising criminal defendants,
probation officers, parole officers, do not have access today
to child support order information or arrearage information on
the population of people they supervise.
The privacy considerations in the current regulations and
law prevent those individuals from having access to information
about support orders and an individual's compliance.
It seems to me that might be something that could be added
that would allow individuals supervising the criminal
population in the country to be able to check and make sure
their charges are staying compliant with the important issue of
child support enforcement.
Chairman DAVIS. Before we move on, in fact, I will share
personally that is one of our goals. Mr. Lewis and I among a
few others introduced legislation called the ``Standard Data
Act,'' and we got that enacted into law, in the Child Welfare,
Promoting Safe and Healthy Families Act re-authorization last
year. It was also in the Conference Report on payroll tax
affecting unemployment and TANF.
In my mind, particularly from a front line provision
standpoint, having access to that information is very
important. A lot of the populations that we deal with, where a
front line social worker or a caregiver at a non-government
organization could encounter someone, it would be nice to know
if there was a deadbeat dad across the river in another
jurisdiction, to be able to find that.
I have heard exactly the same sentiment almost universally
from folks: the more integrated we can be.
I do not believe that would be a breach of privacy since
that parole officer can see a lot of other things. It might be
less comfortable in public discussion than the child support
payment issue.
Ms. Stephen.
Ms. STEPHEN. Yes. I would like to add to that thought. When
I heard this concept earlier today from Mr. Burlingame, I was
intrigued because we are in the midst of discussions with our
courts in Michigan, and specifically with the establishment of
a judicial data warehouse, and are interested in access to
certain information that is not part of the public record.
Our child support program is a court based system, but
arrearage amounts do not go in the public record.
That type of information, making that available to judges
when they are sentencing, so the judge actually has a full
picture of this individual's life and responsibilities,
probably would be very useful.
It is unlikely to be possible under today's rules and
regulations.
I appreciate the fact this is being given consideration.
Chairman DAVIS. Hopefully, we will be able to do something
along those lines that would ease the process where it could
simply be garnishment of pay. It may take a while to get to
that point.
It took us seven years to get to the first provision that
Mr. Lewis and I saw go into law, and Mr. Doggett and our other
colleagues.
Did you want to say something, Mr. Berlin?
Mr. BERLIN. I just would restate what I said earlier:
getting researchers access to individual level data with
personal identifiers and with the appropriate protections; and
secondly, encouraging blanket agreements between agencies so we
do not spend all this time negotiating over the same issue
every single time there is another study funded.
Chairman DAVIS. Just to share a personal viewpoint, we
often get into these discussions in the Congress when in fact
many of our colleagues who argue about this issue go out and
use their credit card or one of those loyalty fobs at a store,
where there are reams and reams of data being used to forecast
management to collection activities, and all the privacy is
encrypted and quite reliable.
I think we could easily achieve a high standard because we
are dealing with so much smaller of a population and much more
limited data fields in the long run.
Just another general question. What would we lose, and more
specifically, families in need of child support lose if we do
not introduce and pass legislation dealing with this issue?
Why do you feel it should be done now?
Ms. Farley.
Ms. FARLEY. We currently work in a patchwork situation
working with individual bilateral treaties. Requirements vary
from country to country.
I think what families will lose and continue to lose is the
support. Either they will not get the support at all, as Ms.
Stephen mentioned, or there is going to be a delay in receiving
the support.
We do have the uniform law Commission's recommendation for
the 2008 amendments. A lot of uniform laws are presented to the
states, and what sometimes happens when states are considering
that uniform language is that states will put their own
personal touches on it, so it does not end up being uniform in
the long run.
I think it is important for Congress to require that every
state adopt the uniform law verbatim.
That way, we will be able to comply with the terms of the
Convention.
I would also say the need for Congress to act now is that
other countries, including the European community, are
considering and moving toward ratification, and some of those
countries are countries where we do not currently have access
to their systems.
By ratifying the Convention, becoming a party to the
Convention, our citizens would have access to services in
countries where they currently do not have access.
Chairman DAVIS. Thank you very much. With that, I would
like to recognize Mr. Lewis from Georgia for five minutes.
Mr. LEWIS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I want to
join you in thanking the witnesses for taking their time to be
here today in support of this legislation.
I just want to ask a question, and anyone can respond. I
have a letter from a mother from Georgia who wrote to the
Federal Office of Child Support Enforcement that said ``I
recently went through a divorce, and soon after, my ex-husband
fled the country to avoid child support payments.''
She went on to say ``I heard he is in Argentina. I
currently live in Georgia with my two children. Is there
anything I can do?''
I want to ask you, how would the United States'
participation in the Hague Treaty help this mother and the
other parents like her, to assist with enforcing an order to
non-custodian parents who flee the country to avoid his or her
child support?
Would you care to respond?
Ms. STEPHEN. I think you have described exactly the kinds
of situations that we face with unfortunately some frequency in
Michigan.
At this point in time, we can contact the authorities in
Argentina. We can try to make some inroads, but establishing
child support is a multi-step process.
First, you have to know where that parent is. Then you have
to give adequate notice to the parent, establish the
obligation, and set up a process to collect it.
All of that takes structure that we do not have access to
today, even if it is a bilateral agreement country, and I am
not sure. I do not have that right in my notes.
The Hague Convention and the enabling legislation would
actually put in place some standardization of processes that
would allow us to accomplish all of those steps, if both
Argentina and the United States were members of the Treaty
Convention.
That is really exactly what we are talking about. That is
the kind of problem we need to solve for families.
Mr. LEWIS. Anyone else care to respond?
[No response.]
Mr. LEWIS. In your opinion, how important is it that
Congress quickly pass this piece of legislation?
Ms. STEPHEN. I have been in this program for most of my
career, and I think this is a very significant step forward for
families whose cases have been closed, flat out closed, nobody
is trying to do anything any more because we have run into a
dead end, because they have an international component.
Those children deserve the support services that we could
provide if we can start this ball rolling.
The phrase that comes to mind is ``If we build it, they
will come.'' I am convinced there are many cases out there that
are outside the system now because we have been unable to be
helpful, and we will be able to move some of those ahead.
I have a case with a seven year old. The father lives in
Australia. We have been unable to get any locate, and that
child has gone without child support for seven years.
Those are the kind of cases that we need to be moving, and
we have to start somewhere, and this is really the place to
start.
Thank you.
Mr. LEWIS. Thank you. Yes, sir?
Mr. BURLINGAME. Mr. Lewis, the only thing I would add is on
the data standards' front, systems continue to be built and
purchased, both in the 4-D area and in the court area.
They are not waiting for these standards to be adopted or
developed, so every system that gets built or purchased without
standards as a guidance, has the potential to have to be
retrofitted or rebuilt or refitted at some point in the future,
once these standards are established.
The sooner there could be a mandate for the establishment
of standards in this area along with any other area in the
child welfare area, I think the better.
Mr. LEWIS. Ms. Farley.
Ms. FARLEY. I might also add that in moving toward
ratification, Congress approving and the implementing of
legislation is a step in that process.
Once you have passed the legislation, states will have two
years in which to implement or to pass legislation.
Once you act, we are still at least two years away from
ratification. The sooner you act, the sooner we can move
towards ratification and actually begin to benefit from the
Convention.
Mr. LEWIS. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Chairman DAVIS. I thank the gentleman. The Chair now
recognizes the gentleman from Minnesota, Mr. Paulsen, for five
minutes.
Mr. PAULSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you all for
being here today.
In today's world, when we talk about moving information
between systems and making it more available out there, we have
the issue of identity theft, of course, and the protection of
personal identity information, which is sometimes called
``PII.''
That is a primary concern whenever anyone talks about
expanding access to data.
I am just wondering, Mr. Berlin, you touched on this a
little bit right at the end of your testimony, I think. Can you
please walk us through exactly how the privacy protections
provided by the draft legislation language would work if
researchers were given access to data in the National Directory
of New Hire's?
What other types of Federal data do researchers already
have access to, what privacy protections surround that data?
Have they been effective? How do those protections compare to
those, as an example?
Is there any reason to believe overall that these private
protections would be any less effective than those that are in
place right now involving other areas of Federal law?
Mr. BERLIN. I can describe briefly the steps that we take.
We work with a lot of other firms that also do this kind of
work and have typically found that they follow very similar
procedures.
We have a chief data security officer and a data exchange
manager. We begin by meeting with and working with the agency
and identifying the most reliable, safest way to actually
transfer the data.
That data transmission method usually follows the National
Institute for Standards and Technology's strict standards for
data exchange. It is called ``For Data in Transit.''
It is a standard protocol, and NIST has established a set
of very strict rules around these transfers. I think you want
to make sure that those kinds of rules are what the agencies
are relying on and using.
Those data teams then work with and store that personally
identifiable data on a secure, centrally located server. It can
only be accessed by a limited number of people, with the need
to know.
Once we have the data, the very first thing it does is
strip the data of all personal identifiers, and create
essentially a random number for every individual in the
dataset.
That is the dataset we work with. The dataset that has
personally identifiable information on it is set aside on this
secure server that is controlled by a data security officer.
There is almost no reason for us to be using the dataset
with personal identifiers on a regular basis.
At the end of the study, we then use the National Institute
for Standards and Technology's standards for ensuring that the
data is destroyed in an effective way, and that it cannot be
recaptured elsewhere.
As I said, most firms use those same kinds of procedures.
At our organization, and to the extent I know of other
organizations, there has never been a breach of any of that
data.
We and some other organizations we work with actually get
sensitive Social Security Administration data, which if you
think about it comparatively, in the NDNH case, we are only
talking here about knowing quarterly earnings, essentially.
The Social Security data on disability and other things are
much more sensitive, and we do get that data now, and we meet a
very high standard for that data.
Federal agencies generally have compliance officers who
visit your organization unannounced and confirm that you are in
fact following all these procedures.
Mr. PAULSEN. The data you would use as a researcher under
the draft legislation would be just as protective of privacy
concerns as it is for what other Federal agencies use right
now?
Mr. BERLIN. Exactly. The truth is the thing that everyone
seems to have forgotten here is we already have this data. We
are just getting it from the states. We follow these procedures
now.
For 30 years, we have been doing this. Again, at
unnecessary cost because the same data is already sitting at
the Federal level.
Mr. PAULSEN. Ms. Farley, can I just follow up and ask, I
think you may have mentioned privacy protections within the
Hague Convention, but can you please tell us a little bit more
about those?
Ms. FARLEY. Yes. The drafters of the Convention were very
aware of the personal information that would be gathered and
transmitted.
There are several provisions within the Convention that
deal with this issue. One, protection of personal data, any
personal data that is gathered and transmitted can only be
used--it is restricted to be used only for the purpose for
which it is being gathered and transmitted.
Someone getting information for collection of child support
could not hand that off to some other entity to use it for
another purpose.
There is also a provision related to confidentiality, in
that the participating countries must protect the information
they gather in accordance with their national law.
The third one has to do with non-disclosure. It is a
sensitivity to domestic violence. Authorities are prohibited
from disclosing or confirming information that would jeopardize
the health, safety, and liberty of the persons.
The other thing I would mention is as the Treaty was
developed, tools were also developed to help implement it,
including a set of forms, recommended forms, and all of the
recommended forms clearly identify what information is personal
and should not be transmitted, and that these countries should
be very careful in handling.
Chairman DAVIS. Thank you very much. The gentleman's time
has expired. The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from North
Dakota, Mr. Berg, for five minutes.
Mr. BERG. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I just have a couple of questions. First of all, North
Dakota is one of the ten states that have enacted legislation
with the Hague Convention.
I really have two questions. One is what are the
consequences of us not moving forward at this point?
Ms. Farley, if you could address that, and Ms. Stephen
also. If we do nothing, what are the negative consequences for
doing nothing right now?
Ms. FARLEY. The consequences are we continue the path that
we have, in this patchwork of a system where we have to do
bilateral agreements with individual countries, the
requirements of those agreements may vary as far as what kind
of documents are required and services that can be performed,
and for those countries where we do not have a bilateral
agreement, we will continue to have difficulties.
It is just a continuation of the difficulties we are
experiencing right now.
Mr. BERG. Ms. Stephen.
Ms. STEPHEN. Yes, I would certainly second what Kay Farley
has said. As I said earlier, the many cases that have just been
out and out closed because we lack the ability to process the
child support for that family.
Those cases are all across the globe. Our nearest neighbor
probably would be cases from Mexico, where we have a number of
Mexican individuals who work and live in Michigan, and we are
unable to accomplish anything in terms of child support with
the country of Mexico.
Those families will grow up--those children will grow up
with the support of only one parent, and that is a tremendous
struggle in a time when both parents should be supporting their
kids.
Mr. BERG. Michigan is a problem? I am just kidding.
My second question, last question, relates to there are 40
states who have not signed this or enacted this. What is the
problem? What is the barrier for them acting on this?
Ms. FARLEY. I think the barrier is they are waiting for
Congress to act. They want to take clues from you as to whether
you are going to require verbatim implementation.
I think they are waiting for you. It is not that they are
not supportive. They just want to take direction from you all
before they move forward with their state legislation.
Mr. BERG. Okay.
Ms. STEPHEN. I am not aware of any opposition to this. I am
not aware of any concern among the child support directors
across the country, and we are a fairly tight group.
I do not believe that anybody is waiting because they do
not believe this is the right thing to do. I think they are
waiting to know that this is the direction that Congress wants
us to go.
Mr. BERG. We are all going to move in this direction. Thank
you. I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman DAVIS. Thank you very much. I want to thank each
of the witnesses who have come here today. I also thank you
again for your flexibility at the beginning of the hearing
where we had to take that brief intermission.
We would like your continued input as we move forward on
the draft legislation to introduce and hopefully pass that in
this Congress. I would value that very much.
If members have additional questions, they will submit them
to you directly in writing, and what we would ask you to do is
share those answers not only with the members but also with the
Committee so we can get them in the record for all to see.
With that, I thank you again for coming, I thank the
members for participating, and the Committee stands adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 3:02 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]
[Submissions For The Record follow:]
Eastern Regional Interstate Child Support Association, statement
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