Purpose


The Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) Program caseload has risen substantially from 24,017 TANF eligible adults in State Fiscal Year (SFY) 2006-2007 to 34,817 TANF eligible adults in SFY 2007-2008. At the end of the SFY 2008-2009 the caseload stood at 47,554, representing a 49% increase from SFY 2006-2007. These numbers include many individuals who have either exhausted their unemployment benefits or do not qualify for unemployment compensation. Congress passed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5) that provides supplemental appropriations for job preservation and creation, infrastructure investment, energy efficiency and science, assistance to the unemployed, and State and local fiscal stabilization. Subtitle B of the Act creates the Emergency Contingency Fund for State Temporary Assistance for Needy Families Program (“Emergency Fund”), and authorizes states that have an increase in assistance caseloads or increased expenditures for non-recurrent short term benefits or for subsidized employment to request additional federal TANF funding in fiscal year 2009 and fiscal year 2010. The Emergency Fund provides grants equal to 80 percent of a state’s increased TANF and maintenance-of-effort expenditures on basic assistance, non-recurrent short-term benefits, and subsidized employment to help families unable to find jobs or to help families with low earnings during this difficult economic time. In order to determine which individuals are eligible and most qualified for these subsidized employment projects, and to create and fill jobs as quickly as possible, it is necessary that the eligibility determinations and the application forms incorporated by reference into this emergency rule be established immediately, without the delay attendant with regular rulemaking procedures. The Agency will immediately begin the regular rulemaking process for incorporating these forms and procedures into Chapter 60BB-10, Florida Administrative Code.