Y Foster Care and Guardianship Subsidy Payments

Revised 10/12/2021

Policy

How foster care and guardianship subsidy payments are treated depends on the following:

If payment is under...	And the program is...	Then the treatment is...
Title IV-E Foster Assistance	ALTCS	The customer is categorically eligible (MA502); and The income is counted as unearned income to the customer for the ALTCS Share of Cost (MA1201B). Exception: Any part of the payment intended for the foster care provider as an incentive or service payment, and not to support the child, is counted to the foster care provider.
	SSI-MAO MSP	Since the customer automatically gets AHCCCS Medical Assistance (MA414), this income is only counted as unearned income to the customer when determining the Child Allocation amount: For SSI-MAO (MA611A); and For MSP (MA612). Exception: Any part of the payment intended for the foster care provider as an incentive or service payment, and not to support the child, is counted to the foster care provider.
	Adult Caretaker Relative Pregnant Woman Child KidsCare	Excluded.
Title IV-E Independent Living Initiatives payments from the Transitional Youth or Adult Living Programs.	All programs	Excluded.
Title IV-B or Title XX Foster Assistance	All programs	Excluded.
State Funded Foster Assistance	All programs	Excluded.
Guardianship Subsidy Payments	ALTCS SSI-MAO MSP	Counted as unearned income to the person in care.
Guardianship Subsidy Payments	Adult Caretaker Relative Pregnant Woman Child KidsCare	Excluded.
Grandparent Kinship Payments	All programs	Both the one-time payment of up to $300 and the monthly payment of $75 are excluded.

Definitions

Term	Definition
Foster Care Payments	A payment made to a foster care provider for the purpose of meeting the needs of the person in care.
Grandparent Kinship Payments	Payments to a grandparent responsible for raising grandchild(ren) in the grandparent’s home. There are two types of payments available: A one-time payment of up to $300 per child to help cover the cost of additional furniture and other expenses related to moving the child into the home; and A clothing and personal allowance of $75 per month per child.
Guardianship Subsidy Payments	Subsidy payments provided by the Arizona Department of Child Safety (DCS) for children who are placed in the care of a Legal Permanent Guardian.

Proof

Income is first obtained through the Federal and State Data Services Hubs. If needed, other proof includes:

Check stubs;
Written statement from the agency providing the money; or
Collateral contact with the agency providing the money.

AHCCCS Staff: To verify Adoption Subsidy payments from the Arizona Department of Child Safety (DCS) or Tribal Adoption Subsidy payments, submit a PCR.

FAA Staff: Submit a Policy Clarification (PC) request to the FAA Policy Support Team (PST) when the foster care or guardianship subsidy income has been verified as Title IV-E and HEAplus does not exclude the income. When the verification provided does not include enough information to identify the type of subsidy, submit a PC to PST.

Legal Authority

This requirement applies to the following programs:

Program

Legal Authorities

ALTCS

SSI-MAO

Medicare Savings Program

20 CFR 416.1102 and 1123

20 CFR 416.1124(c)(8)

AAC R9-22-1909

Adult

Caretaker Relative

Pregnant Woman

Child

KidsCare

42 CFR 435.603

42 CFR 457.10, 300, 301 and 315