District of Columbia

Human Services: A Caring City

Our strategy should be fourfold: work, opportunity, security, and community – all of which must come together to build families that not only survive, but live successfully in safe neighborhoods, with assurance that their children will have a full and fair chance to make their way in American society. To fulfill these aims, we must build not only a government that serves all of our people effectively and courteously, but harnesses all of our civic resources – business and labor, faith-based and secular, leaders from every sector, and our people themselves – to solve our problems.

	Make Mental Retardation Developmental Disabilities Administration a cabinet-level agency and change the name to a more appropriate Department of Disability Services (30 days)		Perform independent death reviews of all MRDDA decedents (30 days)
	End the 90-day moratorium on new Medicaid waiver placements for people with disabilities (30 days)		Award contract for the construction of a new Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services facility (30 days)
	Propose solutions to resolve the shortage of family shelter spaces (60 days)		Initiate Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services assumption of responsibility for education and mental health at Oak Hill (60 days)
	Begin to migrate to performance-based contracting for Child and Family Services Agency providers (90 days)		Working with a private non-profit, initiate an effort to explore a Housing First policy to address homelessness (90 days)
	Open the new supermarket in Ward 8 (90 days)		Identify and eliminate the back-log of Department of Mental Health provider payments (90 days)
	Provide additional downtown shelter space by resolving the Franklin School issue or other means (90 days)		Explore increasing TANF monthly payments to parity with Maryland (100 days)
	Create new and clear pathways into the job market for youth at risk of disconnection from school and work or already disconnected by developing a pilot career training requirement in a DC services contract to provide job training and opportunities (100 days)		Hire a permanent Director of the Department of Employment Services (90 days)
	Explore family group decision-making strategies for youth crime reduction (6 months)		Hire a permanent Director of the Department of Human Services (6 months)
	Hire a permanent Director of the Office on Aging (6 months)		Hire a permanent Director of the Department of Disability Services (6 months)
	Renovate six units at Oak Hill consistent with the implementation of the Missouri model (6 months)		Propose a comprehensive Career and Technology (vocational) Education strategy for DC Public Schools (6 months)
	Eliminate unnecessary District rules that limit use of Medicaid to fund services (1 year)		Develop a strategy to transform child care, Head Start, and pre-kindergarten programs into a coordinated system that assures school readiness by age 5 (1st year)
	Develop a strategy to ensure that no parent will be unable to find and keep a job due to the unavailability of affordable child care (1st year)		Develop a strategy to dramatically change the ratio of institutional versus family-based service provision to MRDDA clients (1st year)