Engagement Efforts GenIC - Feedback from Community Providers, Tribal Communities, and Individuals with Lived Experience on Disas

Feedback from Community Providers, Tribal Communities, and Individuals with Lived Experience on Disaster Human Services Preparedness and Response

Administration for Children and Families Generic for Engagement Efforts

0970 – 0630

Supporting Statement Part A

Justification

May 2024

Submitted By:

Office of Human Services Emergency Preparedness and Response

Administration for Children and Families

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services

4^th Floor, Mary E. Switzer Building

330 C Street, SW

Washington, D.C. 20201

A1. Necessity for the Data Collection

The Administration for Children and Families (ACF) Office of Human Services Emergency Preparedness and Response (OHSEPR) at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) seeks approval for the collection of feedback from community-based and tribal human services programs and from individuals with lived disaster experiences to better understand the challenges they experience before, during, or following a disaster, as well as what would help to address these challenges.

Background

Before, during, and after disasters, human services are provided to communities through a network of state, tribal, local, and territorial (STLT) human service programs and community service providers. STLT human services programs are often unprepared and overwhelmed with providing services and addressing the demand for human services during or following a disaster. OHSEPR seeks to identify STLT human services programs’ challenges with service provision and administration before, during, and after a disaster as well as the essential emergency preparedness and response functions in the human services sector. Through focus groups we will engage community human services providers, tribal human services representatives, as well as individuals with lived experience accessing human services during or following a disaster. The focus groups will provide valuable information to inform OHSEPR’s development of preparedness capabilities that are appropriate for STLT human service programs.

These focus groups build upon and are complementary to prior OHSEPR focus groups with various federal, state, and local government officials and national associations that were used to develop phase one of this work, the Disaster Human Services Capabilities Playbook¹. These focus groups will fill key gaps by shedding light on the perspectives of other essential participants in the Disaster Human Services (DHS) ecosystem – tribal human services program representatives, community service providers, and individuals with lived experience accessing human services during or following a disaster. ACF OHSEPR seeks to build on the Playbook by using this feedback to contribute to the creation of the Disaster Human Services Capabilities Framework (DHSCF) which will develop emergency and preparedness capabilities to a more detailed and actionable level than the Playbook. The DHSCF is intended to provide guidance for STLT human services program and providers in the planning, coordination, resources, skills, knowledge, and processes that enable effective delivery of disaster human services. The framework is intended to be used for training and technical assistance to STLT human services departments to improve emergency preparedness and response capabilities in their human services provision.

Obtaining feedback from these select audiences aligns with the objectives of President Biden’s Executive Order 13985: Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government, and President Biden’s Executive Order 14058: Transforming Federal Customer Experience and Service Delivery to Rebuild Trust in Government.^2,3,4 The creation of the DHSCF aligns with the HHS Agency Emergency Preparedness Goals and the executive orders as it provides an outline for STLT government agencies to provide more effective services especially to underserved or disproportionately affected individuals.

Legal or Administrative Requirements that Necessitate the Collection

There are no legal or administrative requirements that necessitate the collection. ACF is undertaking the collection at the discretion of the agency.

A2. Purpose of Survey and Data Collection Procedures

Overview of Purpose and Use

The purpose of this information collection is to learn about 1. community-based and tribal human services programs challenges with preparing for, responding to, and recovering from disasters, and 2. the experiences of individuals accessing human services following a disaster.

OHSEPR will use the synthesized information from them to inform programming and technical assistance efforts and to contribute to the development of a DHSCF with recommendations for STLT human services programs for future disaster preparedness, response, and recovery. This document will be published on ACF’s website as a resource for STLT human service programs. This capabilities framework will align human services with other sectors such as public health and healthcare, which have published capabilities resources for their STLT partners across the nation.

This proposed information collection meets the following goals and uses of the ACF generic clearance for engagement efforts (0970-0630):

• Gathering information from individuals with diverse experiences and perspectives to inform ACF policies and programs.

• Informing program planning

• Development of technical assistance resources

Overview of Information Collections

Information Collection Title	Respondent, Content, Purpose of Collection	Mode and Duration
Community Human Services Providers Focus Group Protocol	Respondents: Staff from community human service programs who work directly with recipients of human services Content: facilitated focus group discussion session, with chat prompts and polling Purpose: to learn directly from community human service programs about issues and challenges as well as what works well regarding emergency preparedness and response. This information will help OHSEPR to develop programming and technical assistance efforts, including capabilities in the DHSCF that are responsive to and appropriate for STLT human service programs and community provider partners.	Mode: Online platforms (e.g., Zoom) Duration: 90 minutes
Tribal Human Services Program Representatives Focus Group Protocol	Respondents: Tribal representatives that support human services programs for their Tribe Content: facilitated focus group discussion session, with chat prompts and polling Purpose: to learn from tribal human service providers about their issues and challenges with emergency preparedness and response. This information will help OHSEPR to develop programming and technical assistance efforts, including capabilities in the DHSCF that are responsive to the needs of tribal communities.	Mode: Online platforms (e.g., Zoom) Duration: 90 minutes
Individuals with Lived Experience Accessing Disaster Human Services Focus Group Protocol	Respondents: Individuals with lived experience accessing various human services during or following a disaster Content: facilitated focus group discussion session, with chat prompts and polling Purpose: to learn from individuals with a perspective about the accessibility and responsiveness of human services before, during, and after the disaster event. This will help to ensure the DHSCF and disaster human services provision are responsive to the needs of disaster survivors.	Mode: Online platforms (e.g., Zoom) Duration: 90 minutes

Processes for Information Collection

The collection of information from community-based providers, tribal human services program representatives, and individuals with lived experience will be conducted via focus groups. There will be two focus groups for each type of respondent and focus groups will be approximately 90 minutes long, with approximately 10 attendees in each session. After the sessions, the relevant information from focus group notes will be analyzed into the categories of the DHSCF and inform the content of the DHSCF.

A3. Improved Information Technology to Reduce Burden

All focus group participants will be contacted via email. Additionally, all focus groups will be conducted in small groups via an online platform (e.g., Zoom). With participant approval, we will record the focus group discussion.

A4. Efforts to Identify Duplication

The information we are seeking to gain through this collection does not currently exist. The information collection for the Playbook did not include focus groups with community-based and tribal human services representatives or individuals with lived experience.

A5. Involvement of Small Organizations

This information includes interviewing representatives from community-based organizations. We will make an effort to reduce the burden on these organizations by scheduling information collection at times convenient for respondents. Additionally, no travel or substantial time outside of the set focus group session will be requested from these individuals.

A6. Consequences of Less Frequent Data Collection

Not applicable. This is a one-time data collection.

A7. Special Circumstances

There are no special circumstances for the proposed data collection efforts.

A8. Federal Register Notice and Consultation

Federal Register Notice and Comments

In accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (Pub. L. 104-13) and Office of Management and Budget (OMB) regulations at 5 CFR Part 1320 (60 FR 44978, August 29, 1995), ACF published a notice in the Federal Register announcing the agency’s intention to request an OMB review of this information collection request for a new umbrella generic clearance. The notice was published on December 11, 2023, (88 FR 85890), and provided a sixty-day period for public comment. ACF did not receive any comments on the first notice. A second notice was published, allowing a thirty-day period for public comment (89 FR 12352), in conjunction with submission of the request to OMB. ACF did not receive any comments on the second notice.

Consultation with Outside Experts

No consultations have taken place with experts outside of the project team.

A9. Tokens of Appreciation for Respondents

It is extremely important to provide those with lived experience, experts, staff, and others providing their feedback for these efforts with equitable compensation or tokens of appreciation for participation. As noted in a 2022 report by the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation³ this “helps ensure a diverse population with varied views can participate.”

A10. Privacy of Respondents

Information collected will be kept private to the extent permitted by law. Respondents will be informed of all planned uses of data, that their participation is voluntary, and that their information will be kept private to the extent permitted by law. Respondents will be asked for their consent to record the focus group session and will be informed that they can retract a statement at any time and their comment will be disregarded.

A11. Sensitive Questions

There are no sensitive questions in this data collection.

A12. Estimation of Information Collection Burden

Burden Estimates

The annual burden for each of the three groups is as follows:

• We expect to conduct two focus groups that will average about 1.5 hours in length with a total of 20 participants from community human service programs.

• We expect to conduct two focus groups that will average about 1.5 hours in length with a total of 20 participants from tribal human service programs.

• We expect to conduct two focus groups that will average about 1.5 hours in length with a total of 20 participants who are individuals with disaster human services lived experience.

Cost Estimates

The cost to the community human services providers and tribal human services respondents was calculated using the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) job code Social Workers, All Other [21-1029] and mean wage data from May 2023, which is $33.08 per hour. To account for fringe benefits and overhead the rate was multiplied by two which is $66.16.

https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes211029.htm

The cost to the disaster lived experience respondents was calculated using 200% of the annual net income of individuals at the Federal Poverty Level ($30,120.00). The hourly wage for an individual with an annual salary of 30,120.00, working full time (2080 hours a year) is $14.48. The Federal Poverty level is often a key determinant of eligibility for receiving federal and STLT government services program support.

https://aspe.hhs.gov/topics/poverty-economic-mobility/poverty-guidelines

Instrument	Total Number of Respondents	Total Number of Responses Per Respondent	Average Burden Hours Per Response	Total Burden Hours	Average Hourly Wage	Total Annual Cost
Focus Group Protocol: Community-based Providers	20	1	1.5	30	$66.16	$1,984.80
Focus Group Protocol: Tribal Human Services Representatives	20	1	1.5	30	$66.16	$1,984.80
Focus Group Protocol: Disaster Lived Experience	20	1	1.5	30	$14.48	$434.40
Total Burden and Cost Estimates:				90	Total Annual Cost:	$4,404.00

A13. Cost Burden to Respondents or Record Keepers

Directly engaging the communities ACF serves and including these individuals in ACF research is in line with the following priorities of the current Administration and HHS:

• Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government (EO 13985)

• Further Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government

• ASPE’s Methods and Emerging Strategies to Engage People with Lived Experience (2021)

• ASPE’s Recruiting Individuals with Lived Experience (2022)

Consistent with the guidance documents referenced, we propose to offer participants an honorarium for their time spent providing their expertise and experience. Specifically, we propose to offer $50 honoraria for participation in the focus group to provide equitable compensation to individuals with lived experience accessing human services during or following a disaster.

Equitable compensation is in line with leading practices for ethical engagement of those with lived expertise and advancing equity for populations who have been historically underserved (as noted in section A1, advancing equity is a priority, as highlighted in the referenced EOs in that section). Providing equitable compensation recognizes the value of the time provided by participants, helps to remove barriers to participation, and affirms that the contributions from those with lived experience are as valuable as the contributions from individuals who are considered experts.

As noted in the 2022 report by ASPE this “helps ensure a diverse population with varied views can participate.” Additionally, in an earlier report it was noted that “Providing [those with lived experience] with compensation commensurate with the rates that other experts—i.e., experts engaged based on their expertise as practitioners or researchers, rather than lived experience—receive helped recognize the valuable and unique expertise that people with lived experience lend, which promoted meaningful engagement.” The report goes on to specify that not doing so could result in “unintended consequences …. when lived experience engagements have scarce resources and experts are undercompensated, which can undermine, disregard, and/or marginalize people with lived experience.”

A14. Estimate of Cost to the Federal Government

The total cost for the data collection activities under this current request will be $8,003.70.

This estimate is developed based on a $50/hourly rate for two contractors for 60 hours of work each ($6,000), in addition to one federal employee, estimated at GS-14, Step 1 ($66.79/hour), for 30 hours of work ($2,003.70).

A15. Change in Burden

This is for an individual information collection under the umbrella generic clearance for ACF engagement activities (0970-0630).

A16. Plan and Time Schedule for Information Collection, Tabulation and Publication

The information collection will occur following OMB approval and is expected to take place over about a two-month period. The information will be compiled and shared among the project team and federal staff. The results of these session will not be published. The information from the focus groups will inform the development of the Disaster Human Services Capabilities Framework and the DHSCF will be made public.

A17. Reasons Not to Display OMB Expiration Date

All instruments will display the expiration date for OMB approval.

A18. Exceptions to Certification for Paperwork Reduction Act Submissions

No exceptions are necessary for this information collection.

Attachments

• Focus Group Protocol: Community-based Providers

• Focus Group Protocol: Tribal Human Services Representatives

• Focus Group Protocol: Disaster Lived Experience

1 Focus group data collection efforts for this first phase were approved under OMB #0970-0531.

2. HHS Agency Emergency Preparedness Goals

3. White House Executive Order 13985

4. White House Executive Order 14058

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