Intended Audience: State/Provincial Government: Legislative Branch
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User Research 
What we learned from talking to 27 families about their experiences applying for child care benefits
This post explores the lessons learned and opportunities for improvement from USDR's research on families' experiences as they navigate the child care journey.
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Human-Centered Design 
Why Governments Should Prioritize UX for Everyone
Through our research understanding the government digital service field and what workers in this field need, we want to help strengthen those existing roles and establish more pathways for promotion and career support, as well as help other teams recognize the value of these skills and create new roles.
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Digitizing Policy + Rules as Code 
Blawx
Blawx is a prototype platform for user-friendly rules as code online. It includes an example encoding of portions of Canada's Old Age Security Act.
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Engineering + Software Development 
Vermont: Piloting A Document Uploader For Benefit Eligibility
Nava built flexible and reusable software and design components to make it easier for Vermonters to access their benefits. These components support Vermont’s long-term vision of integrating eligibility and enrollment processes for all of the state’s healthcare and financial benefit programs.
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“It’s Like Night and Day”: How Bureaucratic Encounters Vary across WIC, SNAP, and Medicaid
Using 83 interviews with Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), and Medicaid beneficiaries, and 35 interviews with staff from those programs, this paper examines how people differentiate their experiences across programs.
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Management 
The Move to Digital Government Requires More Than Just Tech
Processes, power and people are also crucial elements.
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Digital Identity 
Analysis: Digital Authentication and Identity Proofing Requirements in Unemployment Insurance Applications
In February 2023, the Digital Benefits Network at the Beeck Center for Social Impact + Innovation released a dataset documenting authentication and identity verification requirements that unemployment insurance (UI) applicants encounter across the United States. This resource outlines high-level observations from the data and more information about the research process.
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Procurement 
Procurement Testimony at the Michigan Senate Appropriations Committee, Feb 26 2020
Waldo Jaquith from 18F gives testimony to the Michigan Senate Appropriations Committee on how to efficiently appropriate money to technology projects.
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Bloom Housing: Affordable housing portal
A modern system that helps people learn about, apply for, and gain access to affordable housing. Bloom Housing is an open source platform that digitizes the process of finding and applying for affordable housing, turning a time-consuming paper process into a 15 minute activity from one's smartphone or computer.
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Digitizing Policy + Rules as Code 
Policy Rules Database Github
Github repository for Policy Rules Database, which encodes up-to-date rules and provisions for all major federal and state public assistance programs, taxes, and tax credits.
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Digital Identity 
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program: Requirement for Interstate Data Matching To Prevent Duplicate Issuances
The National Accuracy Clearinghouse is an interstate data system used to identify individuals receiving SNAP benefits from multiple states. This interim final rule requires SNAP State agencies to provide information to the NAC regarding individuals receiving SNAP benefits in their states in order to ensure they are not already receiving benefits in another state.
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Policy 
Aligning Systems to Advance Family and Community Well-Being: A Partnership Playbook for Community Action and Human Services Agencies
This playbook outlines the ways Community Action and human services agencies worked together to meet the pandemic challenge—what worked well, obstacles and difficulties, and lessons learned to inform the path forward, partnering to achieve a more equitable recovery. It also explains how communities have leveraged opportunities to partner on approaches that hold the promise of deeper, longer lasting changes for families—work shaped by families’ wishes and strengths and designed to advance both family-level and systems-level change.