(229) Child Support Fund

Child Support Services provides services mandated by Title IV-D of the Social Security Act. The department is operated by the County, administered by the State Department of Child Support Services, and provides services to all families regardless of their economic situation. The program works with parents and guardians to ensure children and families receive court-ordered financial and medical support. Services include locating a parent; establishing paternity; establishing, modifying and enforcing a court order for child support; and establishing, modifying and enforcing an order for health coverage. The department helps recoup partial welfare costs for the County and State through this collection activity. Since 2002, the counties of Santa Cruz and San Benito have operated a regional department of Child Support Services, with Santa Cruz acting as the lead agency.

To accomplish these tasks, the regional department includes administrative staff to oversee budgeting and accounting activities, personnel, payroll, purchasing, information services, and facilities; and program staffing to oversee case intake, establishment, processing, and enforcement activities; legal counsel; and caseload financial management.

• Operational Development and Excellence
• Service delivery enhancement through utilization of
• Healthy and Safe Communities by providing program education and resources to our participants and the community

• The successful implementation and leveraging of Tableau Dashboards to assist Managers, Supervisors and Caseworkers with achieving compliance requirements and proactively completing daily case management activities
• Utilization of current technological tools such as Txt Page Pro, DocuSign, and Tableau Dashboards have assisted with ongoing improvements in the areas of Paternity Establishment, Cases with Orders Established, and Cases with Collections on Arrears
• Continued strengthening of partnerships with the courts, Family Law Facilitator, and Family Law Commissioner through increased communication and collaboration

• Maintain funding and staffing levels, coincident with ongoing increased costs
• Implementation of significant program changes required by AB 207 and SB 343 to implement Earning Capacity income evaluation methodology
• Ongoing development of training, procedural documents and resources to ensure staff can effectively and efficiently serve our community

• Increase Child Support collections through proactive outreach and engagement with the local community
• Improve Federal Performance Measures, including cost effectiveness using innovative tools and resources to track progress and focus on areas of opportunity
• Improve customer experience through enhanced service delivery and customer service tracking

• Add 1.0 FTE Child Support Branch Manager 
• Delete vacant 1.0 FTE Child Support Deputy Director
• Delete vacant 1.0 FTE Child Support Specialist
• Add Temporary Staffing funding in the amount of $30,842 to mitigate vacancies and leaves of absence