Louisiana’s two implementations of TANF are:- The Family Independence Temporary Assistance Program (FITAP) — which provides temporary assistance to needy families.
- Family Independence Work Program (FIND WORK) — an employment, training, and education program for adult FITAP recipients.
Together both these programs serve to decrease family reliance on cash assistance and provide job assistance to help families achieve self-sufficiency. Louisiana has also gone a step further by extending TANF resources to a broader segment of at-risk families and individuals in a group of programs know as TANF Initiatives. Key features of the Family Independence Temporary Assistance Program: In addition to conforming to the major federal TANF rules, including a lifetime limit on receipt of cash assistance for adult-headed families of 60 months and a mandatory work requirement for adult recipients, the State has adopted several distinctive requirements for Louisiana families receiving cash assistance.
These include: - A 24-month time limit on receipt of cash assistance during any five-year period;
- A school attendance requirement for children in FITAP families;
- A time-limited $900 monthly earnings disregard for FITAP recipients;
- Mandatory screening of all adult recipients for illegal drug use;
- Transitional assistance payments for FITAP recipients who leave the program due to employment.
Two of these requirements, the 24-month time limit and the school attendance requirement, obligate case managers to allocate significant time to monitoring recipient compliance. Key Features of the FIND Work program: Adult recipients from single-parent cases must work or participate in work-related activities for at least 30 hours per week, or 20 hours per week if they have a child under age 6. In a two-parent household, both parents must work or participate in work-related activities for a combined total of at least 35 hours per week, without child care, and 55 hours with child care. Work activities may include: - unsubsidized or subsidized employment;
- unpaid work experience;
- on-the-job training;
- job search/job readiness activities;
- vocational education;
- secondary school attendance and GED preparation;
- education directly related to employment (for recipients without a high school diploma or GED);
- job skills training directly related to employment;
- community service; and
- provision of child care services for an individual who is participating in community service.
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