17.3 Self Assessment

State Authority:

None

Overview

The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) of 1996 not only revised federal audit requirements to focus on performance outcomes rather than process steps, but it also amended the Social Security Act by requiring a state-run self-assessment review.  On an annual basis, the Wyoming Child Support Program (CSP) assesses its program based upon specific criteria and reports its findings to the federal OCSE.

Federal regulations require that the Wyoming CSP meet a minimum compliance standard of 75 percent in the following categories:

• Order and paternity establishment;

• Expedited process 6-month;

• Review and adjustment;

• Enforcement of orders;

• Medical support enforcement;

• Disbursement of collections; and

• Intergovernmental services.

A minimum compliance standard of 90 percent is required in the expedited process 12-months and case closure categories.

Policy

Sample

The Wyoming CSP utilizes a combination of the statewide1 and focused2  sampling methods.  The sample for each Wyoming County within the nine Judicial Districts will be stratified into the following categories:

• Order and paternity establishment;

• Expedited process 6-month and 12 month;

• Review and adjustment;

• Enforcement of orders;

• Medical support enforcement;

• Disbursement of collections;

• Intergovernmental services; and

• Closure. 

After the child support cases are stratified, POSSE selects a random starting point and then systematically selects child support cases within each category for each county at a specified sampling interval.  Both the starting point and the sampling interval are based upon the required sample size3.   Finally, the federal OCSS requires a ninety percent4  confidence level in the case closure and expedited process 12 month sample and seventy-five percent in all other categories.  

Once the sample is provided by POSSE, the State CSP Office staff person responsible for the self-assessment review will e-mail the sample list for each county within each judicial district to the appropriate District CSP Office Manager with a request for the physical case files to be delivered by a certain date.

Review

Once the State CSP Office Self-Assessment Reviewer receives the case files, the reviewer will evaluate each case within the sample for each criterion to determine if the desired action was taken as shown in Appendix 17.B – Self-Assessment Review Maps.  The reviewer will place each case in one of the following categories pursuant to the maps in Appendix 17.B:

• Action, 

• Error, or 

• Remove.

Preliminary Findings

The State CSP Office Self-Assessment Reviewer will provide the appropriate District CSP Office Manager with the preliminary results of the self-assessment review for each category reviewed.  The District CSP Office Manager will have ten calendar days to review and respond to those preliminary results.  

Self-Assessment Review Committee

Once each District CSP Office Manager responds to the preliminary results, the State CSP Office Self-Assessment Reviewer will arrange a meeting with the Self-Assessment Review Committee to assess those cases with preliminary errors and that were disputed by a District CSP Office Manager.

The Self-Assessment Review Committee comprised of the Wyoming CSP Program Manager, the State CSP Office Self-Assessment Reviewer, and members of both the public and private District CSP Offices will:

• Meet after the preliminary results;

• Review the District CSP Office Manager response(s) to the preliminary findings in conjunction with the physical case file, POSSE, the Code of Federal Regulations, and Self-Assessment Review Committee Notes (Appendix 17.C);

• Forward to each District CSP Office Manager his or her final review results; and

• Provide a due date seven (7) calendar days from the date the final review results are provided to the District CSP Office Manager for the operational plans by county and district (See Appendix 17.D – Self-Assessment Review Operational Plans) that outline the process to correct identified problems, detail the root cause of noncompliant categories, and describe each districts goals and achievements.

Final Report

The State CSP Office Self-Assessment Reviewer will: 

• Draft the Wyoming CSP self-assessment review report with the following sections :

  • Executive Summary,

  • Methodology,

  • Self-assessment review results,

  • Self-assessment review analysis and corrective action plan, 

  • Program direction, 

  • Program enhancements, and 

  • Conclusion;

• Compile the operational plans provided by the District CSP Offices as an appendix for the Wyoming CSP Self-Assessment Review report; and 

• Submit the Wyoming CSP Self-Assessment Review report to the federal OCSS electronically via the federal OCSS Self-Assessment Reporting System .

Cross Reference

Appendix 17.B – Self-Assessment Review Maps

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1Statewide sampling is a process of extracting a random sample from a state's entire caseload without differentiating between subject matter.  The sampling frame is a list of all the cases minus those cases subject to the exclusion criteria.  (As defined by the federal OCSE in Dear Colleague Letter 02-08 – TEMPO on Statistical Sampling for Self Assessment.)

2The federal OCSE defines focused sampling as a sample whose target population uses each of the eight self-assessment criterion as eight discrete samples.  The sampling is delineated by the eight self-assessment criteria.  In this case, a state would have eight sampling frames and each frame would represent its own particular focus or self-assessment criterion

3See Dear Colleague Letter 02-08 – TEMPO on Statistical Sampling for Self Assessment for detailed information on sample size, interval and starting point.

4See Action Transmittal 98-12 Self Assessment Report and 45 CFR 308.1(b)(1).