Helping Hands

Project Description

Helping Hands aims to provide funding and support to community-based organizations in improving and increasing efforts to contact and inform likely eligible residents and enroll them in public benefits programs. The targeted public benefits programs for Helping Hands include Children's Medicaid, Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), CHIP for pregnant women, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), and the Harris Health Financial Assistance Program. The program aims to enroll at least 1,000 residents in public benefits programs and build sustainable benefits enrollment capacity and knowledge among Harris County community-based organizations. The Alliance of Community Assistance Ministries (ACAM), the intermediary organization, will conduct a granting program to subrecipients to achieve the goal of Harris County Helping Hands.

TARGET IMPACT

The expected impact of the Harris County Helping Hands is the enrollment of eligible Harris County Residents in public benefits programs, therefore reducing household stress and ensuring young children have the supports needed to thrive in early development.

KPIs for this program are currently under development, but will include metrics such as:

  • Number of grants issued to organizations who will enroll Harris County residents
  • Number of Harris County residents enrolled in benefits programs

USE OF EVIDENCE & PROGRAM EVALUATIONS

The Helping Hands program was developed based on considerable evidence documenting the positive impact safety net programs have on child wellbeing and child outcomes. Harris County has significant need for this program with 26% of children living at or below the federal poverty guidelines and 65% of county children living at or below 200% of federal poverty guidelines. Despite the need for and positive impact associated with safety net programs, Harris County has significant gaps in participation for available programs. As an example, some estimates find that 105,000 - 110,000 Harris County children are likely eligible but unenrolled for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and that 85,000 Harris County residents are eligible but not enrolled in Texas Medicaid or the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP).