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The Family Support and Health Care Program ensures that low-income children, the elderly, disabled persons, immigrants and their families have access to health care and public services.
The program focuses on the following issues:
1) Accessing quality health care for children and their parents in low and moderate-income families through Medicaid, the Children’s Health Insurance Program, and private health insurance coverage.
2) Assisting families on welfare, formerly on welfare, or in danger of needing welfare, in becoming or remaining self-sufficient, by improving access to child support enforcement, quality child care, higher education, training, transportation, treatment of substance abuse, Food Stamps, the Earned Income Tax Credit and other tax benefits, Medicaid, affordable housing, and other supportive services.
3) Improving health care and income support for the disabled and elderly poor, with a focus on issues involving Social Security, SSI, Medicaid, Medicare, and on improving mental health services, care in nursing and rest homes, access to community-based care, services to the HIV-positive population, and managed care.
4) Working closely with LSSP’s Immigrant Justice Program to address the above issues as they impact the immigrant population in this region, including addressing language barriers and other barriers which particularly limit access of immigrants, non-English speaking citizens, and their children to public services and health care.
Case Work
The major issues addressed by this program are:
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• Medicaid
• Emergency assistance
• Medicare
• Child care assistance
• Child Health Insurance
Program (CHIP)
• Child Support enforcement services
• Food Stamps
• Quality nursing and rest home care
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• Supplemental Security Income
• Work First Family Assistance
• Social Security
• Benefit diversion
• Mental health services
• Employment supportive services
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Special Projects within the Family Support Program include the HIV/AIDS Legal Assistance Project and the Disability Rights Project
Advocacy
The program represents both individuals and families who contact the program for assistance, and utilizes systemic advocacy strategies to change the rules, procedures and practices of federal and state agencies to ensure access to health care and public services for all affected persons. The Family Support and Health Care program has a strong collaborative relationship with local and state agencies around issues.
Technical Assistance
The program responds to questions and support requests from legal services advocates throughout the state, as needed, and provides ongoing training, individual assistance, and co-counseling to legal services advocates throughout North Carolina on a broad range of issues in public benefits, child support enforcement, and health care. Contact Doug Sea for more information.
The program accepts referrals from all counties in western NC in the priority areas above to the extent resources permit and LSSP is the most appropriate legal representative.
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