HARTFORD HOUSING AUTHORITY
Family Reunification and Employment Program
This program has a comprehensive community – wide impact. It is being carried out in partnership with the City, State, HUD, the HHA Section 3 program, contractors, and the Youth Build program.
Inspired, in part, by the goals of the "Million Man March", Hartford Housing Authority Executive Director John D. Wardlaw initiated the "Family Reunification and Employment Program". Starting with five young men from Charter Oak Terrace as it was being demolished, the program has expanded to other young men from other developments throughout the city of Hartford. The program at the Hartford Housing Authority has now attracted national attention. It was part of the Federal conference on Strengthening the Role of Fathers in Families at the White House; received a Best Practices award from HUD in 1999; and has has been reviewed at NAHRO (National Association of Housing and Redevelopment Officials) seminars over the last several years.
The reunification effort dovetails perfectly with the Authority’s strategic reinvention of public housing in Hartford. Over 2,500 conventional Low Income Public Housing family units have already been reconfigured through a $100 million modernization program supported primarily by the US Department of Housing and Urban Development. Simultaneously, as many families as possible are being enlisted in a self sufficiency process through the Campus of Learners and the Family Investment Centers. The process fosters reunification of families, employment and independence.
To date, 30 men have presented themselves to the Authority and the State of Connecticut Department of Social Services (DSS). They have become employed, they have made arrangements with DSS for back child support, they have taken their children off welfare, and where appropriate, they have rejoined their families and have been added to the Housing Authority lease.
Positive male role models are "officially" missing from urban public housing communities. They are not on the leases; they are not listed with Welfare offices; they are invisible to the formal institutions. THE FAMILY REUNIFICATION AND EMPLOYMENT PROGRAM reverses this epidemic by recruiting young men who want to assume their legal and moral responsibilities with their families and communities.
In most cases, the returning fathers have been employed by Contractor partners working on the massive re-invention of the family developments in Hartford. Through the Section 3 program of the Authority, young men are identified by way of an informal network of agency and resident contacts. One key partner is the State of Connecticut Department of Social Services. After lengthy study of the way the welfare "system" essentially excludes men from their families, DSS and HHA developed a formula that confirms the father’s responsibility but keeps the monetary sanctions in a range that allows the families to succeed.
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