Mission
The National Tribal Child Support Association (NTCSA) is a non-profit organization that partners with tribal, state, and federal professionals to improve the quality of life for Indian children through communication, training, and public awareness.
Vision
NTCSA is committed to uniting tribal, state, and federal programs as the voice for Indian children.
Objective
NTCSA’s main objective is to benefit Indian children and develop, promote, and enhance family values by bringing together tribal programs such as tribal and CFR courts, Head Start, and Indian child welfare and domestic violence programs.
History
In 1975, the federal government implemented the Child Support Enforcement Program (CSE) in response to the ever increasing single parent families and the ensuing spiraling costs of public welfare. The CSE program was statutorily created by Title IV, Part D of the federal Social Security Act and provides the basis for child support enforcement initiatives in 54 states and territories of the United States.
Recognizing that the existing program was insufficient to meet the needs of tribal families, lawmakers passed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunities Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) in 1996 which authorized funding for tribes to operate their own IV-D Child Support Enforcement programs. Today, there are more than 60 federally recognized tribes and tribal consortia in 22 states enforcing child support on behalf of tribal children both nationally and abroad.
The first Tribal Child Support Enforcement Training Conference was held in 2001 and was hosted by the Chickasaw Nation, who was one of nine tribes serving as a pilot program for the child support enforcement initiative in Indian Country. The 2001 conference focused on the then interim rule for tribal child support enforcement. From that original gathering, the National Tribal Child Support Association (NTCSA) was created and brought to life as a national forum for education, collaboration and discussion of the regulations and best practices to insure tribal children and families receive the highest level of services under the Federal Rule.
NTCSA is comprised of members with an interest in tribal child support services and its activities are overseen by Board of Directors elected from the membership. NTCSA’s purpose is to provide a national resource designed to benefit Indian children by uniting tribal, state and federal partners to promote and preserve the interests of those children and their families.