Dear Dr. Heller:
Reducing undistributed collections (UDC) remains an important goal for state child support programs. Over this past year, we have worked together to support the identification of UDC and its reduction, in our own states and nationally through our collaboration with your office. Our "best practices" report provided to you earlier this year identified the approaches used by states who have tackled the tough problem of reducing UDC. In addition, NCCSD proposed categorization of UDC to be reported to your office by all states for the OCSE 34A report and is currently working with OCSE on the schedule for that report which will capture the specific dollar information for the categories and aging for UDC.
We recognize that the federal Office of Child Support Enforcement will be required to report to Congress on UDC, once pending legislation is passed. Like you, NCCSD wants to ensure that the report to Congress reflects that our states have worked diligently to ensure prompt distribution of collections to families and to reduce UDC. To that end, we seek to continue our partnership with your office to work toward an appropriate national goal for UDC that focuses on continuous improvement.
States support the establishment of a national goal for a reduction in UDC. The setting of such a goal can be accomplished once the data from the reporting categories of UDC on the OCSE 34A form and the draft schedule is available. Until such data is available it would be difficult to set a realistic national goal for UDC as we will not have a clear understanding as to the level of UDC for individual states or the nation as a whole. Once such data is available, it will provide the opportunity to establish a benchmark for improvement.
Until all states know where they are through consistent, nationally standardized reporting of UDC, rather than setting a concrete standard, NCCSD supports a goal of continuous improvement by each state, no matter where they are along the path toward reducing UDC. A national goal of continuous improvement by each state will require a way to track a state's performance over time. We propose that states' performance be evaluated by comparing "unresolved" UDC on line 9d with total collections for the fiscal year. Such a concentration on the "unresolved" UDC directs states efforts to those collections for which a state's action is required, and should ultimately result in an overall reduction of UDC.
NCCSD looks forward to continuing our dialogue and our partnership to make sure that families receive the support they need.