Promoting Safe and Stable Families

What this funds

The MaryLee Allen Promoting Safe and Stable Families (PSSF) appropriation provides funding for the PSSF program, the Personal Responsibility Education Program (PREP), and Title V Sexual Risk Avoidance Education (SRAE) (originally authorized as Abstinence Education). The appropriation for the PSSF program includes both mandatory and discretionary budget authority. The Social Security Act of 1935 (P.L. 74-271) authorized the first federal grants for child welfare. In 1993, the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (P.L. 103-66) created the Family Preservation and Family Support Services Program, which became Promoting Safe and Stable Families, under title IV-B-2 of the Social Security Act, with passage of the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997 (P.L. 105-89). The Family First Prevention Services Act (FFPSA) (P.L. 115-123) amended and reauthorized the program through FY 2021. The SUPPORT for Patients and Communities Act (P.L. 115-271) further amended PSSF by adding a requirement for ACFC to award a grant or contract for a family recovery and reunification program replication project. The Family First Transition Act (P.L. 116-94) provided grantees with additional resources to implement the requirements of FFPSA, including $500 million for FFPSA Transition Grants. That law also renamed the program the "MaryLee Allen Promoting Safe and Stable Families Program." In FY 2025, the Supporting America's Children and Families Act (P.L. 118-258) reauthorized and amended programs under title IV-B of the Social Security Act, including PSSF, with changes effective in FY 2026. This Act increases PSSF mandatory funding by $75 million for under section 513 of the Social Security Act and reauthorized Abstinence Education under section 510 of the Social Security Act through FY 2014. Federal support of abstinence education programs began in 1982 through the Adolescent Family Life Act under the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1981 (P.L. 97-35). In 1996, federal funding for abstinence programs grew with the enactment of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) (P.L. 104-193). In FY 2018, Administration for Children, Families, and Communities Page 192 Congress amended section 510 to discontinue the Title V State Abstinence Education program and to create the Title V SRAE program, which provides funding to states and community-based organizations to teach youth to avoid non-marital sexual activity and other risky behaviors. The SRAE program also addresses the social, psychological, and health gains to be realized by refraining from non-marital sexual activity and engaging in healthy relationships. PREP addresses the prevention of pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections, including HIV/AIDS. PREP also addresses the transition to adulthood by focusing on six statutorily mandated "adulthood preparation" topics (adolescent development, educational and career success, financial literacy, healthy life skills, healthy relationships, and parent-child communication) and targets services to high-risk youth populations. Both programs were reauthorized for FY 2018 and FY 2019 at $75 million per program per year in the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018 (P.L. Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2026 (P.L. 119-75) authorized both programs through December 31, Starting in FY 2022, and every year since, Congress has included a General Provision to expand funding flexibility for research projects in ACFC. All research funding provided for in each Appropriations Act can remain available for five years following appropriation. This has allowed for additional time for research and evaluation projects within the Promoting Safe and Stable Families program. In FY 2025, ACFC obligated $547.9 million for programs in the PSSF appropriation. This account is subject to sequestration in accordance with section 251A of the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit PSSF is an annually appropriated, capped entitlement program designed to enable each state and eligible Indian tribe, tribal organization, and tribal consortium to operate a coordinated program of community- based services. As amended by the Supporting America's Children and Families Act, the four major service areas funded by the program include: ' Family preservation services for children, youth and families, which are designed to help families (including kinship and adoptive families) alleviate crises, maintain the safety of children in their own homes, support families who are preparing to reunify or adopt, and assist families to obtain needed services. The statute also allows grantees to support infant safe haven programs. ' Family support services, which are community-based, including services provided by family resource centers designed to promote the safety and well-being of children, youth, and families; increase the strength and stability of families (including adoptive, foster, and kinship families); support and retain foster families to help ensure the availability of quality family-based settings for children in foster care; promote parental competencies; strengthen parental relationships and promote healthy marriages; and enhance child development, including through mentoring ' Family reunification services, which are provided to a child who is removed from home and placed with kinship caregivers or in a foster care setting or a child who has been returned home and to the parents or primary caregiver in order to facilitate the reunification of the child safely and appropriately, in a timely fashion, and to ensure the strength and stability of the reunification. Grantees may use funds for counseling; substance-use disorder treatment services; mental health services; assistance to address domestic violence; temporary child care; therapeutic services for Administration for Children, Families, and Communities Page 193 families, including crisis nurseries; peer-to-peer mentoring and support groups for parents and primary caregivers; services and activities to facilitate access to, and visitation of, children in foster care by parents and siblings; and transportation to services. ' Adoption promotion and support services, which are designed to encourage more adoptions of children out of the foster care system when adoptions are in the best interests of the children. They include pre- and post-adoption services and other activities designed to expedite the process PSSF authorizes formula grant funding to states, tribes, and territories. The statute also provides that before PSSF funds are distributed to states for support of these services, a part of the program's funding must be reserved for other grants and activities, including Regional Partnership Grants (RPGs), grants for caseworker visits, Court Improvement Program grants, grants for kinship navigator programs and prevention services, evaluation, research, and technical assistance. Formula grants are distributed to states based on t

Extracted from Administration for Children, Families, and Communities, p. 12. Verbatim; nothing here is paraphrased.

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