2019 NCSEA Board of Directors Election Photo Michele Ahern Assistant Deputy Commissioner NYC Office of Child Support Services www.linkedin.com/in/micheleahernnycsocialservices/
2019 NCSEA Board of Directors Election Michele Ahern Assistant Deputy Commissioner NYC Office of Child Support Services Experience and Achievements • Assistant Deputy Commissioner for Enforcement Operations, NYC Office of Child Support Services which collects over $770 million in child support payments annually (2013-Present) • Responsible for appropriate application of administrative and judicial enforcement remedies; managing NYC’s noncustodial parent employment programs which place over 1,000 participants in employment each year; and identifying new collection strategies. • Launch new initiatives to improve case outcomes, including an early intervention program for parents with new orders; a debt reduction initiative for parents engaged in employment services and a noncustodial parent job training program as part of a national demonstration. • Chief Advisor to the Commissioner and other leadership roles , NYC Human Resources Administration , NYC’s principal social services agency serving over 3 million people annually. Advised Commissioner on agency-wide policy and management issues. Led priority cross-agency initiatives. Developed and led employment programs for low-skilled workers. Directed citywide storm response efforts in aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. (2008-2013) • Senior Budget Analyst , White House Office of Management and Budget . Budget & policy oversight responsibility for income support programs including federal child support program and SNAP. Analyzed and recommended federal child support policy proposals. Three-month detail as Acting Chief, Income Maintenance Branch. (1998 – 2008) • Policy Analyst , US Dept. of Health & Human Services . Analyzed 1996 welfare reform legislation. (1995 – 1998)
NCSEA Participation & Involvement • Member of NCSEA’s Legislative Education Sub- Committee, 2016-Present • Moderator, 2019 Policy Forum Workshop: Helping Noncustodial Parents by Providing Structured Supports for Co- Parenting and Developing Programs that Incentivize Work • Moderator, 2017 Leadership Symposium Workshop: Child Support Distribution-Is it Time to Eliminate Retained Collections? • Moderator, 2016 Leadership Symposium Workshop: Reducing Child Support Debt Owed to the Custodial Parent 3
In your own words, why are you running for the NCSEA Board? • I am running for the NCSEA Board because I am passionate about the importance of the child support program in the economic security of single parent families. As child support professionals, we know that the reach of the child support program is enormous, serving 1 in 5 children in the US. We also know that child support is a vital source of income for low-income families, accounting for about half of the average income of low income parents who receive it. • I am also running for the NCSEA Board because I recognize NCSEA’s unique role in advancing the program, especially in two key ways. o The first is the role that NCSEA plays educating policy makers about the program. The child support program is enormously complex and diverse in the way it is structured and implemented across the country. In addition, its purpose has evolved substantially since it was first founded as welfare cost recovery program to one that is primarily focused on supporting family well-being. As a result of its complexity and evolution, the current purpose and impact of the child support program is not always well understood by those outside of the program. This is true despite the program’s successes. o NCSEA is also a valuable forum for child support professionals to come together. As well as the child support program does, we all know that there remains opportunity for improvement. Through NCSEA’s conferences and communications, we can learn from each other and from the diversity of state and local programs and policies. Collaboration and information sharing through NCSEA can drive the program’s ability to continue to evolve and to become an even more effective support to families. • I also have a combination of local and federal child support experience, and more than twenty years working across social service programs which will enable me to make a strong contribution as an NCSEA board member. Having worked at the federal Office of Management and Budget, I bring experience and understanding of the federal budget and policy-making process. I also understand how child support actually plays out on the ground from my current position with the New York City Office of Child Support Services. In addition to my work in child support, I also have considerable experience in TANF, SNAP, workforce development and other social service programs, which have multiple intersections and opportunities for collaboration with child support. 4
Describe what you will do to advance NCSEA as an organization • I see two opportunities to advance NCSEA as an organization. • First, I would work to further increase the participation of professionals from outside of child support in NCSEA’s conferences and webinars. The child support world tends to be somewhat limited to those who work in the program and a small group of researchers and advocates who understand the value of the program. Expanding participation in NCSEA conferences would not only enrich the conference experience, but would also achieve the goal of increasing knowledge of the program beyond the child support community. • The child support program intersects with many other policy and program areas - child welfare, TANF, employment programs and criminal justice, just to name a few. Sometimes we find that child support’s intersection with other programs has unintended negative consequences or we may find that there may be opportunities to improve policy in ways that have not yet been explored. I would advocate for more collaboration with other programs through NCSEA both to increase knowledge of the child support community and to bring in more participants from outside of child support. • Second, I believe that there are opportunities for NCSEA to play an even greater role as an advocate for the child support program. NCSEA has a singular ability to serve as the voice for state and local child support programs across the country. To be sure, there is a great deal of diversity in state and local child support programs. However, there is also enormous commonality in the issues and challenges that the program faces. • As a Board member, I would explore how NCSEA could play a more active role in identifying policy positions that a majority of members support and advocating on behalf of those policies to Congress and the Administration. With the Board’s leadership, an NCSEA advocacy plan could coalesce around a common vision of the “future of child support” that could be used as a communication tool with federal and state policy-makers. 5
Describe your vision on how you would help shape the future of child support • As an NCSEA board member, I would be excited to work with others to address a few broad challenges. • The first is how the child support program can continue to improve collections. With the availability of new data sources and enforcement tools under 1996 welfare reform, child support collections grew significantly. Over time, however, maintaining high growth in collections has become increasingly challenging. It now seems especially important for programs to collaborate around and share strategies for making the most of existing data sources, and as well as to come up with ways of pursuing less readily available income and assets. • The second is how the program can continue to improve its support of low-income noncustodial parents. While the child support program is largely effective at compelling parents with regular wages to pay child support, parents with a weaker attachment to the labor force are less able to meet their support obligations and more likely to experience a host of problems stemming from their inability to pay. I am interested in how supports and services for low-income noncustodial parents can be strengthened and expanded, as well as how the processes for establishing and enforcing orders can be improved to better meet the needs of low-income parents. • There are many ways that I would envision working through NCSEA to address these challenges. NCSEA conferences and webinars are an opportunity to bring people together to share best practices in these areas, including with other external stakeholders. It is also vital that NCSEA continue to advocate for changes in federal policy that would increase the program’s ability to collect child support, and enable the program to work more effectively in concert with partner programs. • Finally, I am also interested in how state efforts to direct more collections to families can be further supported. There is strong policy rationale and flexibility within federal law to direct more child support to families. Yet thus far, states have largely not taken full advantage of the options for a variety of policy, programmatic and budget reasons. I would advocate continued research and discussion within NCSEA to help up to understand the barriers so that further progress can be made in this area. 6
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