06-7763. Proposed Information Collection Activity; Comment Request

Proposed Projects

Title: DHHS/ACF/ASPE/DOL Enhanced Services for the Hard-to-Employ Demonstration and Evaluation: Rhode Island 15-Month Survey Amendment.

OMB No.: 0970-0276.

Description: The Enhanced Services for the Hard-to-Employ Demonstration and Evaluation Project (HtE) seeks to learn what works in this area to date and is explicitly designed to build on past research by rigorously testing a wide variety of approaches to promote employment and improve family functioning and child well-being. The HtE project is designed to help Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) recipients, former TANF recipients, or low-income parents who are hard-to-employ. The project is sponsored by the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation (OPRE) of the Administration for Children and Families (ACF), the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE) in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), and the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL).

The evaluation involves an experimental, random assignment design in four sites, testing a diverse set of strategies to promote employment for low-income parents who face serious obstacles to employment. The four include: (1) Intensive care management to facilitate the use of evidence-based treatment for major depression among parents receiving Medicaid in Rhode Island; (2) job readiness training, worksite placements, job coaching, job development and other training opportunities for recent parolees in New York City; (3) pre-employment services and transitional employment for long-term TANF participants in Philadelphia; and (4) home- and center-based care, enhanced with self-sufficiency services, for low-income families who have young children or are expecting in Kansas and Missouri.

Materials for follow-up surveys for each of these sites were previously submitted to OMB and were approved. The purpose of this submission is to add physiological measures to the follow-up effort to the Rhode Island study.

Respondents: The respondents to this component of the Rhode Island follow-up survey will be low-income parents and their children from the Rhode Island site currently participating in the HtE Project. As described in the prior OMB submission, these parents are Medicaid recipients between the ages of 18 and 45 receiving Medicaid through the managed care provider United Behavioral Health (UBH) in Rhode Island who meet study criteria with regard to their risk for depression. Children are the biological, adopted, and stepchildren of these parents, between 1 and 18 years of age.

The annual burden estimates are detailed below, and the substantive content of each component will be detailed in the supporting statement attached to the forthcoming 30-day notice.

Annual Burden Estimates

Instrument	Number of respondents	Number of responses per respondent	Average burden hours per response	Total burden hours
RI 15-month, parent physiological component	400	8	5 minutes or .08 hrs	266.66
RI 15-month, young child physiological component	160	8	5 minutes or .08 hrs	106.66
RI 15-month, youth physiological component	242	8	5 minutes or .08 hrs	161.33

Estimated Total Annual Burden Hours: 534.65.

In compliance with the requirements of Section 3506(c)(2)(A) of the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, the Administration for Children and Families is soliciting public comment on the specific aspects of the information collection described above. Copies of the proposed collection of information can be obtained and comments may be forwarded by writing to the Administration for Children and Families, Office of Administration, Office of Information Services, 370 L'Enfant Promenade, SW., Washington, DC 20447, Attn: ACF Reports Clearance Officer. E-mail address: [e-mail]. All requests should be identified by the title of the information collection.

The Department specifically requests comments on: (a) Whether the proposed collection of information is necessary for the proper performance of the functions of the agency, including whether the information shall have practical utility; (b) the accuracy of the agency's estimate of the burden of the proposed collection of information; (c) the quality, utility, and clarity of the information to be collected; and (d) ways to minimize the burden of the collection of information on respondents, including through the use of automated collection techniques or other forms of information technology. Consideration will be given to comments and suggestions submitted within 60 days of this publication.

Dated: September 13, 2006.

Robert Sargis,

Reports Clearance Officer.