COMMUNITY PARTNERSHIPS
RESOURCES

From the Center for Community Partnerships in Child Welfare (CCPCW):

The website of the CCPCW www.cssp.org/center, provides information about the community partnerships approach, and useful publications to download or order, including:

What is the Community Partnerships for Protecting Children Approach?  This brochure describes the underlying principles, goals, core elements and typical practices of community partnerships.  An excerpt:  Core elements are:

• Services are individualized to build on strengths and address each child’s and family’s specific needs.  Plans are developed through a family team meeting process that brings together family members, their support network, and service providers.
• The CPS agency adapts its policies and practices to support a community partnership approach.  It helps staff members strengthen their connections with the neighborhoods they service.
• A broad neighborhood network of services and supports is easily accessible for children and families.
• Decision making about service priorities and the direction of the partnership is shared by local residents, service providers and representatives of the network. 

Creating a Community Partnership: Guidance from the Field.  Implementation advice from the four original sites. Rollout Guidance (11/01) and an associated Checklist discusses six ingredients for successful implementation of the Community Child Protection approach:

• Commitment of key stakeholders;
• Assessment of community characteristics;
• Community engagement;
• Keeping the community child protection approach intact;
• Adequate staffing and financing; and
• Technical assistance and support.

Getting Started in Community Child Protection (7/01).  How different stakeholders can initiate community partnerships, and what their role can be.

• Community Partnerships for Protecting Children:  A brief overview of the four original community partnerships sites in Louisville, KY, Jacksonville, FL, St Louis, MO and Cedar Rapids, IA (1999)

Reports on the experience of changing policy and practice in St. Louis, community engagement in Jacksonville and shared decision-making in Louisville. 

Safekeeping newsletters. The 4/05 edition includes: 

• Establishing a Positive Community Presence for Public Child Welfare Agencies
• The Community Partnership Practice Model
• Human Resource Managementís Role in Recruiting, Hiring and Retaining a Workforce Committed to a New Practice Model
• The Pay-Off of Comprehensive Training

Publications on family team conferencing

From the National Child Welfare Resource Center for Organizational Improvement:

The stakeholder involvement page of our website provides some resources and information on community partnerships:

• A curriculum to train child welfare workers to create, use and sustain working partnerships for the benefit of children and families:  Community Partnerships and Linkages:  Reaching Out to Work Together
• Two fact sheets , on a continuum of community partnerships: Developing Community Partnerships in Child Welfare and on helping agencies to develop local community partnerships:  Community Partnerships for Child Protection

The Fall, 2005 edition of our newsletter Child Welfare Matters includes an article on community partnerships in Iowa. 

State and Local Initiatives: 

Iowa:  Community Partnerships: www.dhs.state.ia.us/cppc.  This website describes the community partnerships for protecting children initiative in Iowa, including detailed information on some of the strategies being used , family teams, shared decision making boards, and networks or neighborhoods and communities. 

Georgia:  This website describes the work Georgia is doing to implement the community partnerships for protecting children approach in eight counties: http://www.gafcp.org/state/cppc.htm.  The effort is being managed by the Georgia Division of Family and Children Services (DFCS) and the Family Connection Partnership (FCP) which supports a statewide network of county collaboratives committed to improving the quality of life for Georgiaís families. Fact sheet on FCP: http://www.gafcp.org/whoweare/FCPFactSheet.doc

Illinois:  Local Area Network (LAN) 29 in Mercer and Rock County, Illinois, has developed a child welfare community collaborative to improve outcomes for children.  See http://cwresource.org/hotTopics/commCollabs/rockIsland.htm

LAN uses existing community resources and natural support networks to strengthen families.  See: http://www.systemofcareillinois.com/lan_29.htm

Missouri: Caring Communities Community Partnerships are decision-making entities that partner with public agencies to develop and monitor strategies to achieve core results for children and families.  The Family and Community Trust is a state level entity that provides leadership in collaboration with Caring Communities to improve the condition of Missouriís families.  See  http://www.mofact.org/

New York City: The Administration for Children and Families (ACF) in New York City is committed to neighborhood based services, in which neighborhood networks are developed on the local level to improve the well being of children and families in the child welfare system.  See http://www.nyc.gov/html/acs/pdf/nbs_brooklyn.pdf