Keeping Families Together Act

To amend the Public Health Service Act to establish a State family support grant program to end the practice of parents giving legal custody of their seriously emotionally disturbed children to State agencies for the purpose of obtaining mental health services for those children.

2/15/2005--Introduced.
Keeping Families Together Act - Amends the Public Health Service Act to allow the Secretary of Health and Human Services, acting through the Administrator of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, to award competitive matching grants to States to establish systems of care to treat and provide services to all children who are in the custody of the State or at-risk of entering into the custody of the State for the purpose of receiving mental health services. Requires State to use grant funds for certain activities, including to:
(1) expand public health insurance programs to cover community-based mental health and family support services for such children and their families that will be sustainable after the grant has expired;
(2) provide outreach and public education concerning available programs and activities; and
(3) provide training and professional development for personnel who work with such children.
Requires the Administrator to establish a task force to examine:
(1) problems of mental health in the child welfare and juvenile justice systems;
(2) issues with respect to access by children and youth to mental health services; and
(3) the role of Federal agencies in promoting access by children and youth to mental health services. Amends Title XIX (Medicaid) of the Social Security Act to permit the use of the Medicaid home and community-based services waiver to provide mental health services to children as an alternative to care in inpatient psychiatric hospitals.


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Sponsor

• Rep. James Ramstad [R, MN-3]
• and 29 Co-Sponsors
  • Rep. John Boozman [R, AR-3]
  • Rep. Michael Capuano [D, MA-8]
  • Rep. Michael Castle [R, DE-0]
  • Rep. Ben Chandler [D, KY-6]
  • Rep. Luis Fortuno [R, PR-0]
  • Rep. Barton Gordon [D, TN-6]
  • Rep. Maurice Hinchey [D, NY-22]
  • Nancy Johnson
  • Mark Kennedy
  • Rep. Patrick Kennedy [D, RI-1]
  • Rep. James Langevin [D, RI-2]
  • Rep. Sander Levin [D, MI-12]
  • Rep. James McDermott [D, WA-7]
  • Rep. John McHugh [R, NY-23]
  • Rep. Martin Meehan [D, MA-5]
  • Rep. R. Bradley Miller [D, NC-13]
  • Rep. Tim Murphy [R, PA-18]
  • Rep. Sue Myrick [R, NC-9]
  • Rep. Charles Pickering [R, MS-3]
  • Rep. Todd Platts [R, PA-19]
  • Rep. David Price [D, NC-4]
  • Jim Ryun
  • Sen. Bernard Sanders [I, VT]
  • Rep. Janice Schakowsky [D, IL-9]
  • Rep. Christopher Shays [R, CT-4]
  • Rep. Fortney Stark [D, CA-13]
  • Rep. Lee Terry [R, NE-2]
  • Rep. James Walsh [R, NY-25]
  • Rep. Gerald Weller [R, IL-11]
  close

Committees

• House Energy and Commerce
• 1 more
  • House Energy and Commerce
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Amendments

This bill has no amendments.

Amendments to H.R.823

Number	Status	Purpose

Bill Status

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Introduced		Voted on by House		Voted on by Senate		Considered By President		Bill Becomes Law
February 15, 2005

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All Bill Actions

• Feb 25, 2005: Referred to the Subcommittee on Health.
• Introduced on Feb 15, 2005.
• Feb 15, 2005: Referred to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce.

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Related Issue Areas:

• Children
• Academic performance
• Budgets
• Case management
• 56 more
• Child health
• Child welfare
• Community health services
• Continuing education
• Criminal justice
• Criminal statistics
• Custody of children
• Data banks
• Dropouts
• Education
• Educational accountability
• Educational statistics
• Elementary and secondary education
• Elementary education
• Executive departments
• Families
• Family courts
• Family services
• Federal advisory bodies
• Federal aid to child health services
• Foster home care
• Government information
• Government paperwork
• Government publicity
• Government statistics
• Group homes
• Health insurance
• Health planning
• Health policy
• Home care services
• Housing
• Intergovernmental fiscal relations
• Job training
• Juvenile delinquency
• Law
• Medicaid
• Medical care
• Medical screening
• Medical tests
• Medically uninsured
• Medicine
• Mental health services
• Patient satisfaction
• Performance measurement
• Poor children
• Preventive medicine
• Problem children
• Psychiatric hospital care
• Secondary education
• State and local government
• State finance
• State laws
• Technology
• Welfare
• Welfare waivers
• Youth services

Data from the Congressional Research Service

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