Legislative Updates

S. 4472, Health Care Capacity for Pediatric Mental Health Act: This bill would establish programs to improve access to pediatric mental health and substance use disorder services, particularly in underserved and high-need areas. Grants to health care providers would support coordination of services to meet community needs, workforce training, and expanding health system capacity to provide pediatric mental health and substance use disorder care.

S. 4747, Investing in Kids’ Mental Health Now Act: This bill would increase Medicaid payments for kids’ behavioral health services to improve access to care. It would also give guidance to states on providing these services through telehealth and by expanding mental health crisis care capacity.

S. 3479, Building a Sustainable Workforce for Healthy Communities Act: This bill updates and extends a program at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that supports the use of community health workers to improve health outcomes in medically underserved communities.

S. 2210, Better Care Better Jobs Act: This bill would provide funding for state Medicaid programs to improve home and community-based services (HCBS) such as home health care, personal care, case management and rehabilitative services. It would also provide support to states in making specified HCBS improvements, particularly with respect to access, utilization, and the home care workforce.

S. 4502, Supporting the Well-Being and Mental Health of Grandfamilies Act: This bill would reauthorize the Federal Advisory Council to Support Grandparents Raising Grandchildren with improvements to address trauma and effects of the pandemic. 

S. 2013, Medical Nutrition Equity Act: This bill would expand coverage under Medicare, Medicaid, and private health insurance to cover medically necessary foods, vitamins, and individual amino acids for the management of certain digestive and metabolic disorders and conditions.

S. 4489, Grandfamilies Act: This bill would provide that a child of a relative eligible for Old-Age and Survivors Insurance benefits is eligible for such benefit payments if that child meets specific conditions. It would also revise Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) eligibility requirements for children living with specified caretaker relatives. The bill would encourage states to enact temporary guardianship laws, provide grants for state plans to support caretaker relatives, and require the Administration for Community Living to provide grants for establishing cross-sector partnerships that support families with caretaker relatives.

S. 4443, Informing Grandfamilies Act: This bill would require states to notify kinship caregivers about the care and placement options under federal, state, and local laws, the requirements to become a foster family home, whether the state has elected to make guardianship assistance payments, and other policies under the state program that may assist such caregivers.

S. 4362, Prohibiting Detention of Youth Status Offenders Act: This bill would amend the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1974 to eliminate the use of valid court orders to secure lockup of status offenders and for other purposes. This bill would also eliminate the valid court order (VCO) exception, which allows for juveniles to be detained over non-criminal offenses.

S. 1275, Family Violence Prevention and Services Improvement Act: This bill would reauthorize, with improvements, the Family Violence Prevention and Services Act, which funds emergency shelters, the National Domestic Violence Hotline, and other assistance for victims of domestic violence. It would also fund violence prevention programming and culturally appropriate services in underserved communities.

S. 4256, Protecting Infants from Formula Shortages Act: This bill would require infant formula manufacturers to notify the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) of any circumstance that is likely to lead to a meaningful disruption of the U.S. infant formula supply, including a discontinuance or interruption of manufacturing. It would also require the FDA to notify manufacturers of non-compliance and require risk and redundancy plans to prevent manufacturing issues.

S. 1270, Access to Healthy Food for Young Children Act: This legislation would make several improvements to the Child and Adult Care Food program (CACFP) in order to increase access for children and improve program administration, including by allowing daycare providers to serve an extra meal or snack for children in extended care.

S. 1590, Caregivers, Access, and Responsible Expansion (CARE) for Kids Act: This legislation would expand access to free meals for children who are being raised by grandparents or other caregivers, easing the financial burden for caregivers who have taken on the important responsibility of raising children for the parents who are unable to do so.

S. 2663, School Modernization and Efficient Access to Lunches for Students (School MEALS) Act: This legislation would make commonsense improvements to school meal programs, including by providing technical assistance grants, extending the timeframe for schools to elect community eligibility provision and expediting the timeline by which states must implement improvements to their certification processes. 

S. 853, the Wise Investment in Children (WIC) Act: This legislation would extend eligibility for the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) program for children to age 6. Additionally, the bill gives states the option to certify infants and postpartum mothers for two years.

S. 2664, School Hunger Elimination Act: This legislation would make vital improvements to the School Breakfast and National School Lunch Programs to increase access to more vulnerable children, reduce administrative burdens for schools and reduce school meal debt and lunch shaming. This legislation includes expanding direct certification for children receiving Medicaid and establishing direct certification for children receiving Supplemental Security Income. 

Child Nutrition Reauthorization: On July 27, 2022, the House Education and Labor Committee advanced H.R. 8450, the Healthy Meals, Healthy Kids Act. The Healthy Meals, Healthy Kids Act is a comprehensive reauthorization of federal child nutrition programs. This bill includes several provisions from each of Senator Casey’s child nutrition bills.

S. 4259, PREP for All Students Act: This bill would establish the Council on Emergency Response Protocols, which would provide guidelines for states, early childcare and education settings, local educational agencies and institutions of higher education to use in developing and implementing emergency response protocols that are inclusive and accessible.

S. 3605, Fostering Success in Higher Education Act: This bill would provide formula grants to states for activities to improve college access, retention, and completion rates for foster and homeless youth. States that receive such grants must award subgrants to institutions of higher education to carry out these activities in partnership with child welfare agencies and organizations serving homeless youth.

S. 3228, Creating Early Childhood Leaders Act: This bill would revise requirements for effective school leadership programs that are funded by Teacher Quality Partnership Grants. Specifically, the bill requires the leadership programs to train early education leaders on skills concerning early childhood development and instruction of children from birth through age eight.

S. 2410, Safe Schools Improvement Act: This bill would require states to direct their local educational agencies (LEAs) to establish policies that prevent bullying and harassment of elementary and secondary school students based on race, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability or religion. LEAs would provide students, parents, and educational professionals with annual notice of the conduct prohibited in their disciplinary policies, students and parents with grievance procedures that target such conduct and the public with annual data on the incidence and frequency of that conduct at the school and LEA level.  

S. 2206, Young American Savers Act: This bill would establish a permanent Federal Child Savings Account Program, with such accounts being tax-exempt and distributions excluded from a child's gross income. Parents or guardians of a child would be able to make contributions to an account for the child's educational expenses. An account could also fund a Roth Individual Retirement account or an ABLE account for disabled individuals. Distributions from such accounts would begin on the earlier of the date a child turns 26, receives an associate's or bachelor's degree, or enlists in active duty military service.

S. 1486, Pregnant Workers Fairness Act: This bill would prohibit employment practices that discriminate against reasonable accommodations for qualified employees affected by pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions. It would set forth enforcement procedures, and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission would be required to provide examples of reasonable accommodations that should be provided unless the employer can demonstrate that doing so would impose an undue hardship.

S. 643, Child Poverty Reduction Act: This bill would require the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Census Bureau to take certain actions with respect to poverty measures and data related to child poverty and require the National Academy of Sciences to report annually on child poverty and study other issues, such as policies to reduce intergenerational poverty.

S. 271, Child and Dependent Tax Credit Enhancement Act: This bill would modify the tax credit for employment-related expenses incurred for the care of a taxpayer's dependent to (1) increase to $400,000 the adjusted gross income threshold level above which the credit is incrementally reduced; (2) increase the dollar limits on the allowable amount of the credit; (3) specify rules for married couples filing separate returns; (4) allow an inflation adjustment to the adjusted gross income threshold and the maximum credit amounts, beginning after 2022; and (5) make the credit refundable.

S. 1156, Adoption Tax Credit Refundability Act: This bill would make the tax credit for adoption expenses refundable.

H.R. 928, American Family Act: This bill would modify the child tax credit to make the credit fully refundable, increase the amount of the credit, allow an additional credit for children who are under six years of age, require the amount of the credit to be adjusted annually for inflation, and require the Department of the Treasury to establish a program for making advance payments of the credit on a monthly basis.