HHS AWARDS GRANTS TO COMMUNITIES FOR WELFARE-TO-WORK COORDINATION EFFORTS

HHS Secretary Donna E. Shalala today announced the award of $300,000 in technical assistance planning grants to 16 communities for local activities to help welfare recipients overcome barriers in moving from welfare to work.

"These grants will support communities to reach out and create new partnerships and new solutions in helping people achieve independence," Secretary Shalala said.

The grants will be used to find ways to help communities pool their resources to help people overcome particular obstacles, such as domestic violence, criminal histories, behavioral problems, language barriers, and lack of transportation and child care. The grantee organizations will bring together interested members of their communities, identify gaps in services, create action plans, and coordinate responses among service providers.

"One of the most important things we hope these grants will do is bring people from diverse perspectives together to focus on the problem of serving the hardest-to-serve," said Olivia Golden, HHS assistant secretary for children and families. "This should be truly a community-wide effort."

The grantees, and the amount of each grant:

Coastal Enterprises, Inc., Wiscasset, Maine, $20,000

City of Bridgeport (Conn.) Department of Social Services, $20,000 Programs for Parents, Newark, N.J., $17,673

Private Industry Council of Passaic County, Inc., Passaic County Workforce Development Board, Clifton, N.J., $20,000 Wider Opportunities for Women, Washington, D.C., $20,000

Private Industry Council, Philadelphia, Pa., $20,000
Legal Services of North Carolina, Raleigh, N.C., $20,000
Community Services Programs of West Alabama, Inc., Tuscaloosa, Ala., $14,578 Ramsey County, St. Paul, Minn., $17,800

Springfield Community Federation, Springfield, Ill., $20,000 Total Community Action, Inc., New Orleans, La., $20,000
Spirit Lake Tribe, Fort Totten, N.D., $16,788
Estrada Courts Resident Management Corp., Los Angeles, Calif., $15,000 East Bay Asian Local Development Corporation, Oakland, Calif., $20,000 Port Gamble S'Klallam Tribe, Kingston, Wash., $20,000

Central Council Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes, Juneau, Alaska, $20,000 # # #

Note: HHS press releases are available on the World Wide Web at: http://www.hhs.gov.

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