Resource Format: Standards + Guidance
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Why Framing Matters: Ways to Move Forward
Prior issues of Policy & Practice have introduced framing and what effective framing can do to make our shared narrative more productive and impactful. In this column, APHSA's President and CEO shares two framing strategies that can help us avoid the most common mistakes and produce more effective frames: Widening the lens and using numbers more effectively.
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Digitizing Policy + Rules as Code Using Asset Verification Systems to Streamline Medicaid Determinations
This paper explores the background of the asset verification system requirement, the vendors that administer the systems; and the typical AVS process. It discusses AVSs’ current limitations and highlights best practices for advocates to promote and state agencies to implement to improve the AVS process and streamline eligibility determinations. Finally, it recommends federal action to help AVS states streamline processing.
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Data Streamlining Medicaid Renewals Through the Ex Parte Process
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) should provide detailed guidance and oversight to help states improve automatic Medicaid renewals using available data, through the ex parte process.
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WIC Certification and Eligibility Resource and Best Practices Guide
The WIC Certification and Eligibility Resource and Best Practices Guide is a compilation of existing regulations and best practices that WIC state and local agencies may choose to use when determining eligibility for the program. The guide walks through the certification process.
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Digital Identity Identity Authentication Pilot Projects – Conversion to State Option
This guidance document from the Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) allowed states more flexibility in verifying SNAP applicant identity. This guidance followed six years of pilot projects, during which states gave SNAP applicants the option to authenticate their identity using a set of multiple choice authentication questions produced by a third-party vendor based on electronically matched public records, in place of using traditional methods to authenticate identity. In addition, and consistent with federal law, states participating in the project continued to accept and begin processing any application that included at least the applicant’s name, address and signature, even if the application was otherwise incomplete.
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Digital Identity ID Verification Controls Simulator
This simulator, created by the Joint Financial Management and Improvement Program (JFMIP), allows users to model program performance for a hypothetical government program, based on different identity verification decisions. The simulator illustrates concepts from the JFMIP report on payment integrity.
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Human-Centered Design Unemployment insurance modernization: Examples from states and territories in their unemployment insurance modernization journeys
The U.S. Department of Labor is working with states, territories, and the public to develop strategies to continuously improve the nation’s unemployment insurance (UI) systems. All of the work shown on this site to date came from the Claimant Experience Pilot engagement between U.S. Department of Labor, the New Jersey Department of Labor and Workforce Development and the Arkansas Division of Workforce Services funded through ARPA.
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Human-Centered Design The Federal government is redesigning how it delivers services
Article announcing five new projects by the Office of Management and Budget that will improve experiences the public has with the government during significant movements in their lives. These “life experience” projects are at the center of a new model for how the Federal Government should better design and deliver benefits, services, and programs to the American people during the moments in their lives that matter most.
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How Well Insured are Job Losers? Efficacy of the Public Safety Net
An extensive literature in economics documents large and persistent declines in earnings following involuntary job loss. Though Unemployment Insurance provides the largest buffer against lost income, due to the structure of the program, the neediest are less-well insured (in terms of dollars transferred and percentage of lost earnings replaced) compared to middle and higher income job losers. This has important implications in light of the historic number of job losses during the COVID-19 pandemic.
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Digitizing Policy + Rules as Code Eligibility APIs Initiative
Documentation of 18F's and 10x's Eligibility APIs Initiative
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Policy Delivery-Driven Policy: Policy designed for the digital age
There is a key disconnect between policymakers’ intent and implementation of policies. A user-centric, iterative, and data-driven approach can result result in digital technology that provides much needed data and insights at a substantially lower cost.
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Digital Identity Federal Agencies Need to Strengthen Online Identity Verification Processes
Remote identify proofing is the process federal agencies and other entities use to verify that the individuals who apply online for benefits and services are who they claim to be. If the applicant responds correctly to personal questions, their identity is considered to be verified. However, data stolen in recent breaches could be used fraudulently to respond to knowledge-based verification questions. Alternative methods are available that provide stronger security, but these methods may have limitations in cost, convenience, technological maturity, and they may not be viable for all segments of the public.