Responsible Fatherhood Development and Fragile Families Capacity Building in Public Housing Authorities

A project of the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)  

In keeping with the White House mandate that all federally funded family programs engage and include fathers in meaningful involvement with their children, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has made a major commitment to outreach to the fathers of children living within its public housing communities for the purpose of encouraging reunification of strong nuclear families to benefit and enhance the well-being of their children. The Responsible Fatherhood and Fragile Families Capacity Building Project, managed by the National Partnership for Community Leadership (NPCL), is one such project.A brief overview of the project objectives follows:

Conduct a series of on-site focus groups/consultations at Public Housing Authorities (PHAs) and other HUD-designated sites
NPCL shall conduct a series of on-site Focus Groups/Consultations at public housing authorities around the country to establish information regarding the existing level of fragile families/responsible fatherhood activities, successes and barriers in their efforts, levels of interest, and recommendations from HUD field offices, public housing authorities, residents and other state and community practitioners and partners. NPCL’s approach will be based on extensive experience in conducting similar community-based, fact-finding consultations to determine the present level of responsible fatherhood activities. NPCL shall develop a protocol for the site visits, and in consultation with HUD, will identify up to seven sites, some of which may be currently undertaking efforts to promote responsible fatherhood. NPCL shall meet with practitioners, especially those on or near public housing, fathers/mothers, HUD field offices, housing authority staff and other local appropriate state and community partners. During the site visits, NPCL staff will maintain a client-centered approach and observe program activities. NPCL shall develop a summary report of the site visits.

Develop a Best Practice/Reference Guide
NPCL shall develop a user-friendly desk guide to assist the public housing authorities in implementing responsible fatherhood initiatives and fragile families support programs. The Reference Guide will showcase lessons learned, information and practices from other responsible fatherhood/fragile family activities, programs and initiatives in public housing. The Reference Guide will also include summary research of prior demonstrations, the lessons learned in the site visits and NPCL’s current work in the field. NPCL shall synthesize information from PHA focus groups, prior research practices and summaries from NPCL’s ten (10) Partners for Fragile Families Demonstration Project sites. The publication will be made available for distribution to the general public and will include, but not be limited to, highlights of promising PHA Fatherhood programs and activities from the HUD-designated sites listed below:

Center of Fathers, Families and Workforce Development
Baltimore, Maryland Family Unification
Housing Authority of the City of Hartford
Hartford, Connecticut Chester County Family Matters
Housing Authority of the County of Chester
West Chester, Pennsylvania

Develop and Conduct Fatherhood Development Skills and Capacity Building Workshops
NPCL shall design and implement up to seven capacity building workshops to enhance, enrich and/or start up responsible fatherhood and fragile families support programs and activities at public housing authority settings.   Workshop participants shall include, but not be limited to local PHA officials, other partners, state and community staff, as well as public housing resident leaders. NPCL shall convene these workshops in PHAs of the following initial seven (7) cities approved by HUD and commence recruitment and promotion of the workshops:

Los Angeles, California.
Hartford, Connecticut
Tampa, Florida
Baltimore, Maryland
West Chester, Pennsylvania
Columbia, South Carolina
Dallas, Texas