Protection & Advocacy for Representative Payee The Strengthening Protections for Social Security Beneficiaries Act of 2017 House Bill 4547

The Strengthening Protections for Social Security Beneficiaries Act of 2017 Overview of House Bill 4547 Strengthens oversight by increasing the number of performance reviews of payees, requiring additional types of reviews, and improving the effectiveness of the reviews by the requiring the Protection and Advocacy system of each state to conduct the reviews, on behalf of the Social Security Administration (SSA). Reduces the burden on families by eliminating the requirement to file an annual payee accounting form for parents who live with their children and for spouses.

The Strengthening Protections for Social Security Beneficiaries Act of 2017 Overview of House Bill 4547 Enhances personal control by allowing beneficiaries to designate their preferred payee in advance of actually needing one; and ensures improved selection of payees by requiring the SSA to assess the appropriateness of the preference list used to select payees. Improves beneficiary protections by increasing information sharing between the SSA and child welfare agencies, and by directing the SSA to study how better to coordinate with Adult Protective Services agencies and with state guardianship courts.

The Strengthening Protections for Social Security Beneficiaries Act of 2017 Overview of House Bill 4547 Limits overpayment liability for children in the child welfare system. Ensures that no beneficiary has a barred payee by codifying the ban on individuals with certain criminal convictions from serving as payees and prohibiting individuals who have payees from serving as payees for others.

Title I – Strengthening Oversight and Beneficiary Protection Section 101: Stronger Monitoring of Representative Payees The Social Security Administration (SSA) would be required to make annual grants to the Protection and Advocacy system (P&A) of each state, which would conduct all performance and monitoring reviews of representative payees for Social Security beneficiaries or Supplemental Security Income (SSI) recipients on behalf of the SSA. Such reviews of organizational and individual payees would include statutorily required onsite reviews (including a new requirement to ensure that every fee-for-service payee is statutorily subject to review), payees selected for review on the basis of risk factors for misuse, and payees identified by either the SSA or the P&As as raising concerns about suitability or performance.

More from Section 101: Stronger Monitoring of Representative Payees In addition, the P&As would conduct educational visits for new fee- for-service payee organizations, issue corrective action plans for payees not in compliance with the SSA’s requirements, and refer beneficiaries to other programs and services as warranted. The SSA would retain responsibility for determining misuse of benefits by a payee.

More from Section 101: Stronger Monitoring of Representative Payees The provision establishes a minimum total amount for the grants of $25,000,000 (indexed for inflation), which will support a higher number of reviews. Grant funds would be distributed according to how many beneficiaries with representative payees reside in the state, with a minimum for smaller states, to ensure a viable review program. The SSA would also issue an annual grant to a highly qualified national disability association to provide training and other support for the review program to the SSA and the P&As. The grants to P&As would begin August 1, 2018; the national training and support grant would begin May 1, 2018

Approximate Grant Allocation HB 4537 indicates that allocations will be based on the number of beneficiaries with a Representative Payee in the state. North Carolina has the 9th highest number of Representative Payees in the country Numbers from NDRN project we have 269,473 beneficiaries have a rep payee. Most recent estimates range from $803,116 to $854,942 and will probably change. North Carolina is the 9th in population in the country Approximately 10,390,149 (based on growth estimates) 1.14% increase in population from 2017 3.17% of Americans live in North Carolina

Considerations This program does not require an attorney All staff with access to Personally Identified Information (PII) will need to be ‘cleared’ and trained. We currently have seven current staff and one former staff cleared. All but one of those have experience. A grant at the middle estimate could probably support 5 to 6 new FTEs. First factor will be our shared costs for items like rent, telephone line, generic IT support, equipment, etc. We don’t believe our rent or other overall shared costs will increase so a grant of $803,000 will reduce the over all percentage of shared costs to direct. 12% for share costs = $96,360 Average cost of an experienced advocate’s salary and benefits plus travel and other costs will be $70,000. Dedicated admin staff is $40,000 Travel costs per advocate = $3,000

Where Rep Payee Fits RIM = Rep Payee Investigations & Monitoring Executive Director Director of RIM Rep Payee Unit Rep Payee Team Leader Supevising 5 FTEs Investigations/Monitoring Unit Team Leader Supervising 3 FTEs Admin Assistant

First step would be to create and post a new position for the Team Leader of I&M. Initially, we would hire Rep Payee Reviewers and not a Rep Payee Team Leader. Reviewers would be in the Advocates/Investigator job category with individuals hired with specific expertise - similar to what we do with our Attorneys. Once we hit a critical mass of reviewers, we would create a RP Team Leader position. The goal for Team Leaders is to have each supervise 3 to 5 FTE staff. We estimate that the Rep Payee grant would be in the $800,000 to $850,000 range which would support approximately 6FTEs. Not all of those FTEs would be doing exclusively RP reviews. The grant would have to pay for its share of ‘shred costs’ and part of the salary of the RIM Director and others.