On February 9, 2018, the federal Family First Prevention Services Act (FFPSA) was signed into law as part of Division E in the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018 (H.R. 1892). FFPSA includes reforms aimed at helping children remain safely with their families and avoiding the trauma of foster care, and ensuring that children are placed in the least restrictive, most family-like setting to meet their needs when foster care is necessary. To this end, FFPSA established strict requirements for state child welfare agencies to receive federal matching funds (known as Title IV-E funding) for placing children in group care settings.
In order for states to receive IV-E funding, group care placements will have to meet new Qualified Residential Treatment Program (QRTP) requirements that include: individualized child assessments, case planning, documentation, judicial approval and ongoing review and permanency hearing requirements. With the passage of HB 1900 in April 2019, Washington State adopted changes in state law to implement the requirements of the Family First federal law. The QRTP requirements went into effect on October 1, 2019.
Webinar
This 35 minute webinar, Covering the Basics of QRTP in Dependency Court, was created to help courts understand the law, DCYF’s process for assessing and treating youth, and the new court forms and procedures. The training is a collaboration between CITA, DCYF, the AG’s Office and OCLA.
Resources
- Presentation slides – QRTP Slides Oct 2019
- QRTP FAQ February 2020
- QRTP Process Flow Chart Feb 2020
- QRTP Court Forms
- DCYF’s practice improvement webpage for QRTP information
