Announcement: 2008 Legislative Agenda

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2008 Legislative Agenda

Connecticut Voices for Children and Advocates for Connecticut's Children and Youth have released the 2008 legislative agenda. The full agenda is available for download below.

Promote more strategic state planning and fiscal choices

Establish comprehensive long term planning in Connecticut
Assure stable and adequate state revenues, equitably borne by all residents

Reduce child poverty

Adopt measures to reduce child poverty by 50% by 2014
Reduce child poverty and expand opportunity by adopting a state Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC)

Assure timely and affordable health care

Restore continuous eligibility for HUSKY
Modify HUSKY B to spend all SCHIP funds
Expand legislative oversight of DSS
Maintain HUSKY performance monitoring funds at current FY 09 Levels

Improve access to high quality early care and education for working parents

Increase access to Care4Kids subsidies for low-wage families

Improve outcomes for Connecticut's foster children

Foster school stability for foster children and youth
Improve legal representation of abused and neglected children (and their parents)
Improve outcomes for youth transitioning from foster care

Improve outcomes in K-12 education by enhancing student attendance

Improve the reporting of truancy
Prevent rollbacks in the "In-School Suspension Law"

Downloads

2008 Legislative Agenda (51.52K)

Children's Dental Services in the HUSKY Program: Program Improvements Led to Increased Utilization in 2009 and 2010

In 2008, Connecticut made significant changes in the HUSKY Program that were designed to improve access to dental care for children. The results of this research report show that in 2009 and 2010, the number and percentage of children who receive dental services increased over previous years when the HUSKY Program was delivered through a program of risk-based managed care.

About 60 percent of children in HUSKY A (Medicaid) had preventive dental care and about 33 percent had treatment, significantly more than in previous years.
Nearly 70 percent of children in HUSKY B (CHIP) had preventive dental care, significantly more than in HUSKY A; however, dental treatment occurred at roughly the same rates for children in HUSKY A and HUSKY B.
In HUSKY A, about four in ten children with any dental care had two or more preventive visits, as recommended by pediatric and dental care professionals; the rate was even higher for children in HUSKY B.
Among children under age 3 in HUSKY A, the percentage who were seen for preventive care increased, as did the percentage of children under 3 who received treatment.
As in previous years, Hispanic children were most likely and Black children were least likely to have received preventive care.

Based on these findings, we recommend maintaining provider fee increases and oversight provisions established by the Carr legal settlement beyond the expiration date of August 2012. We recommend continuing to monitor differences in access and utilization associated with race/ethnicity and investigating ways to reduce disparities.

Download this publication from Connecticut Voices for Children.

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