Newsletter: Burdens, Barriers, and Back Benefits
Service delivery is a hot topic in the federal government right now—and who better to weigh in than constituent services staff? Today, we’ll cover some agency developments, including some updates on federal service delivery, and then some coverage of casework in the news.
Also: if your caseload is easing off for the summer, now is a great time to step back and think about how you and your team address burnout and care for yourselves and each other. We have a webinar coming up on July 28th with presenters from the Schwartz Center for Compassion in Healthcare who will be sharing some of their research and case studies from effective measures in the medical world.
Tips on news stories we’ve missed and resources you find helpful are more than welcome: anne@popvox.org.
Agency News
Loss of Medicaid Coverage
Preliminary data suggests that 73% of the 1.5 million Americans who have lost Medicaid coverage this year lost coverage for administrative or procedural reasons (like not returning forms quickly enough), rather than for eligibility reasons.
Ex Parte Renewals
Some states are starting to experiment with “ex parte” renewals for programs like Medicaid, where the state completes required renewal paperwork on behalf of constituents.
Unemployment & UI
With the unemployment rate rising, states are struggling to deliver improvements to UI systems.
Drop in Improper Payments
Between FY21 and FY22, improper payments government-wide dropped by $34 billion, in part due to advances in technology.
Fewer Army Suicides
The Army saw the highest rate of suicides since it began tracking this data a decade ago in the first quarter of 2023.
Army LGBTQ+/Racial Discrimination Moves
The Army has also moved 15 families to evade LGBTQ+ and racial discrimination since it began tracking discrimination-related relocations in 2021.
Social Security Disability Claims Backlog
Social Security’s disability claims backlog was exacerbated in the pandemic by a call center bug that flagged calls from Disability Determination Services (DDS) as “potential spam.”
Immigration Processing Delays for Iraqis
Iraqis who worked for the US military and contractors continue to face delays in immigration processing.
VA
Streamlining Disability Benefits
FAI’s Reynold Schweikert (former CAO) provided testimony to HCVA on how the VA can streamline disability benefits with emerging technology.
Unaccredited Veterans Service Providers
Soaring numbers veterans’ benefit claims also support an industry of unaccredited veterans service providers profiting off veterans’ frustrations navigating the VA.
Police Body Cameras
All VA police officers will be issued body cameras by the end of the year.
Firm Salary Commitments(!)
Bonkers that this had to happen: to speed up hiring, VHA is giving prospective hires firm salary commitments along with their job offers.
Camp Lejeune Case Consolidation
DOJ is pushing the federal judges overseeing the growing number of Camp Lejeune cases to speed up case consolidation for the nearly 1000 pending lawsuits in the Eastern District of North Carolina.
Service Delivery
White House Focused on CX
This White House has been busy on administrative burdens to accessing federal programs, including the Equity RFI, Customer Service Executive Order, Life Stages project, and this week, a comprehensive update on the status of customer experience improvement efforts underway across multiple agencies
Time Tax
Annie Lowrey popularized the term “time tax” to refer to administrative burdens in this seminal Atlantic article.
Implementing Burden Reduction
Administrative burdens scholar Don Moynihan provides some context around the White House’s recent report on progress.
BenCon 2023
The Georgetown Digital Benefits Hub hosted its first conference on benefits delivery. In particular, we were interested in writing rules as code to make policy easier to implement, and a new three-question standard for measuring administrative burden (may be helpful for casework surveys!).
The Limits of CX/Administrative Burden Frameworks
“Customer service” frameworks are useful, but can be limiting on big-picture thinking about reform.
Casework News
Casework Vans
The casework vans are proliferating! We’re aware of at least two, with Rep. Chuck Edwards [R-NC] and Rep. Pat Ryan [D-NY]. If you’re a caseworker in either office… we’d love to hear from you.
Casework Data Aggregator
It looks like House Digital Services, with support from the CHA Modernization Subcommittee, is moving forward on efforts to create an aggregator system for anonymized casework data. We released a white paper with context for DC-based staff on casework, and recommendations for the program.
Constituent Services Fair
This is a neat model for a multi-level constituent services fair in partnership with the House, Senate, federal agencies, State legislature, and County officials.
Guide to Good Constituent Services
This was a lovely reflection on casework from the office of Rep. Sylvia Garcia [D-TX].
Medal Ceremony for 100 Year Old WWII Veteran
Medal ceremonies are always such a moving part of casework (Rep Brett Guthrie [R-KY]).
Back Benefits
And who doesn’t get excited about massive back benefits checks (Rep Daniel Webster [R-FL]?
Casework Stats
Great example for mid-year casework stat reports (Rep Maxwell Frost [D-FL]).
District Office Security
House Leg Branch Approps Chair Rep. Mark Amodei (R, NV) introduced a manager’s amendment to the leg branch approps bill directing the Sergeant At Arms (SAA) to undertake a comprehensive review of district office security and potential cost for upgrades.
ICYMI: Ensuring Caseworker Expertise is Considered in Discussions of How Agencies Will Use AI
If you’ve been mostly ignoring AI… you’re not alone. We’ve got you covered with a Case Notes post on the buzz around generative AI, and some ways that AI may impact federal services (and therefore casework) in the coming years.
Upcoming Events
Caseworker Burnout & Care
Experts from the Schwartz Center for Compassion in Healthcare share their innovative approaches to supporting caregivers facing burnout and trauma in the medical field and ways these lessons may be applied to Congressional contexts.
Question for the Quorum
Have you interacted with the Customer Experience office of any of the big casework agencies? We’d love to hear about it if so.
Comments, questions, suggestions, tips, concerns? Did someone forward you the newsletter, and you’d like to subscribe? Send all of the above my way: anne@popvox.org.
Anne Meeker
Deputy Director
