[Federal Register Volume 67, Number 188 (Friday, September 27, 2002)]
[Notices]
[Pages 61140-61141]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 02-24657]


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DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

Administration for Children and Families

[ACF/ACYF/CB-2002-03]


Grants to the National Indian Child Welfare Association and the 
National Association of Counsel for Children

AGENCY: Administration on Children, Youth and Families (ACYF), ACF, 
DHHS.

ACTION: Notice of awards.

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SUMMARY: Notice is hereby given that ACYF will award grant funds 
without competition to the National Indian Child Welfare Association 
(NICWA) and the National Association of Counsel for Children (NACC). 
These grants are being awarded to unsolicited proposals that conform to 
the applicable program objectives, are within the legislative 
authorities, and propose activities that may be lawfully supported 
through grant mechanisms. Both applications are of outstanding and 
unique merit. Each activity presents an opportunity to produce 
meaningful, sustainable, and useful results in an area of significant 
interest to ACF.
    The NICWA project will support a three year pilot project to 
collect data analogous to that collected by the National Child Abuse 
and Neglect Data System (NCANDS) in three Native American areas. 
Currently, there is no reliable information on the extent and nature of 
child abuse and neglect (CAN) in American Indian/Alaska Native 
Communities. Most American Indian tribes and Alaska Native corporations 
or villages, as sovereign nations, provide their own child protection 
services, and data from them are not part of any

[[Page 61141]]

national CAN data collection. NICWA proposes a demonstration pilot 
project to design and test a data collection system with six American 
Indian tribes and/or Alaska Native corporations and/or villages with 
effective recordkeeping systems. These entities will report CAN events 
to NICWANet, an interactive and accessible web-based network developed 
by NICWA (through a Technology Opportunities Program grant). NICWA will 
work with the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (NCANDS) 
contractor support team to assure that the data collected by NICWANet 
is compatible and could be submitted to NCANDS by the collecting 
entity.
    NICWA also proposes to involve other stakeholders, such as the 
Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA and the Indian Health Service (IHS), 
throughout the project to promote maximum utilization of the data. The 
goal of the pilot demonstration is to develop a model of a national 
tribal CAN reporting system. Participating tribes will receive 
stipends, hardware, software and technical assistance to develop 
competence and capacity for sustaining the data collection activity.
    The NACC project will develop a pilot a certification program for 
attorneys who represent public child welfare clients or represent 
children in family or dependency courts. The NACC and the University of 
Michigan Law School proposed creating a national certification program 
for child welfare (CW) lawyers. Children in the CW system need 
competent representation for legal process to function smoothly and 
ensure their safety and permanence. Data show that children often are 
not well served in court, due in part to the lack of knowledgeable and 
well-trained attorneys with expertise in representing the child, the 
parent and the child welfare agency; and anecdotally, belief in the 
need for improved legal practice for children is widespread. To correct 
this problem, NACC proposed a system that measures competence and then 
certifies competent representatives to the courts and other potential 
employers. Child welfare law has become increasingly complex and 
specialized, as Federal legislation, such as the Adoption and Safe 
Families Act of 1997 and State laws have made child protection and 
foster care cases even more legally complicated. Lawyers, to be good 
advocates for children and effective in the courtroom, must understand 
the social and psychological implications of a case and what those mean 
developmentally for the child.
    The American Bar Association (ABA) and the State Justice Institute 
(SJI) have recommended certification as a means of improving the 
quality of legal services for children. Certification will establish 
standards of professional competence (be competency based), provide a 
measure of effectiveness of lawyer training programs and improve the 
quality and efficiency of CW court cases through a process that is non-
governmental, professionally driven and supported, and creates 
incentives for excellence. NACC has prepared its application to the ABA 
Standing Committee on Specialization to approve the certification 
program, as the ABA has approved certification programs in other 
specialties such as Bankruptcy, Trial Practice, Estate Planning, and 
Elder Law. This specialty would be ``Juvenile Law--Child Welfare.''
    NACC proposes to identify and define lawyer competencies (i.e., 
knowledge and skills), present the competencies in a manual, guide the 
development of training programs, and pilot a certifying examination. 
Evaluation and revision will be an integral part of the iterative 
process. NACC has submitted documentation of support for the American 
Academy of Adoption Attorneys, the ABA Center on Children and the Law, 
the SBA Standing Committee on Specialization, the National Council of 
Juvenile and Family Court Judges, and the National Institute of Trial 
Advocacy. Colorado, Michigan and New Mexico have offered to serve as 
pilot certification states. The program has every likelihood of being 
self-sustaining following development.
    The project periods for both awards will be for 36 months, 
beginning September 30, 2002 and ending September 29, 2005. Each 
grantee will be awarded $200,000 for use during the first twelve months 
of the project period. The grantees may in the second and third years 
of the project periods be awarded additional noncompetitive 
continuation funding of up to $200,000 per year, each year, depending 
on the availability of funds, satisfactory performance by the grantee, 
and a determination that such continued funding would be in the best 
interest of the government.

    Authority: These awards will be made pursuant to the Child Abuse 
Prevention and Treatment Act, 42 U.S.C. 5106 (CFDA 93.670) and the 
Promoting Safe and Stable Families program: Section 430 of title IV-
B, Subpart 2, of the Social Security Act, as amended, 42 U.S.C. 629 
(CFDA 93.556).

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Sally Flanzer, Children's Bureau, 
Administration on Children, Youth and Families, 330 C Street, SW., Room 
2429, Washington, DC 20447; Telephone: (202) 205-8914.

    Dated: September 23, 2002.
Joan E. Ohl,
Commissioner, Administration on Children, Youth and Families.
[FR Doc. 02-24657 Filed 9-26-02; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4184-01-M