January 2013

In This Issue

Director's Letter: Special New Year's Edition of HCJFS Update Helps You do Business with Us

Did you know? The best way to apply for public assistance

Did you know? Use SuperJobs.com to aid your job search

Did you know? Who to call with questions about child care

Did you know? Hamilton County children are waiting for adoption

Did you know? Top things you need to know about child support 

Adopt Brothers Joe and Keuntay

These sweet and active teens already have a vision for where they want to go in life; they are looking for a family to help guide them there.
More...

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With the new year, I pledge a renewed commitment to customer service.

Hundreds of thousands of Hamilton County residents do business with our agency each year. Our reach is among the top “businesses” in this community.

Whether someone is involved in a child support case – at least one in three Hamilton County residents – a public assistance case – one in six and growing – or involved in one of our smaller programs, such as Children’s Services, Child Care or the SuperJobs Center, we touch a sizable portion of this county’s 800,000 residents in some way.

Nothing on the horizon forecasts 2013 to be any different. Our child support cases are fairly static, the economy remains difficult, and the rate of child abuse is constant. We expect to be just as busy in all our service areas.

The new reality – since we lost more than half of our workforce over the past few years while struggling to live with a deeply reduced budget – is that we will serve more with less.

It is more important than ever we communicate with you and serve you as efficiently as possible. Thus, this edition of Update is dedicated to helping guide you to the best way to do business with us and in answering some of those questions you may have always wanted to ask.

Good customer service is important to us. We often have trouble meeting the demand, but, I assure you, everyone is working hard to ensure your interaction with us takes place quickly, and that you are satisfied to the best of our ability.

And, if we fail, we will bounce back strongly. When we fell behind in processing food assistance applications, we used creativity and put in long hours to turn our failure into great success, now processing more than 90 percent of cases in a timely manner for nine months running. That is a record for metropolitan counties.

I want our consumers to trust we are dedicated to helping them in their time of need. I want the public to know we are committed to making this community a better place to live.

If you are one of our consumers, or you are someone who helps one of our consumers, please use this issue as a guide on the best ways to do business with us, as a tool to find updates on case information and as a source of information for frequently asked questions. Time and energy is wasted – on both ends – if we are not working within the existing system, or if we are inundated with contacts regarding case information that is easily available. (Also, please note the processing deadlines: it is taking us near the 30-day limit to process cases now. We cannot have an update for you until that limit has been reached.)

Whether you want to report a child is being abused, are newly divorced and opening a child support case or are looking for work after being laid off, we have the answers and the help you need.

My goal for 2013 is to make sure you get them as quickly as possible.