Erie County: State of the Child & Family

In 2002, Joel A. Giambra, Erie County Executive, engaged CGR to lead the county’s Blueprint for Change Initiative. This project included three components: 1) examining the current operations of the county’s human service agencies and recommending organizational and service delivery improvements that will result in more cost-effective, integrated, and outcome focused services for children and families; 2) developing a wraparound services project to reduce out-of-home placement of high need children and their families; and 3) preparing a report highlighting demographic trends and data for over 40 indicators of child and family well-being to serve as a tool for planning and priority setting. For the first component, restructuring county human services, CGR met with over 440 community stakeholders and county employees at every level and has completed its review of the current structure and service delivery processes of the county’s human service departments. CGR then developed organizational options for review and consideration by the commissioners. For the Wraparound project, CGR staff worked with a broad-based Steering Committee and is halfway through achieving consensus on the project’s core elements. The third component, the State of the Child and Family in Erie County report, was released in December of 2003.

Report Date: Dec 2003
Author(s): Susan Lepler , Robert Rosenkrantz
Subject(s): Human Services , Human Services , Organizational Development
Location: Erie, New York