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Field operations strained by vacancies and aging systems; DHHS seeks prioritized IT and call‑center investments
Summary
DHHS told the House Finance Committee on March 3 that field eligibility operations face a roughly 23% vacancy rate, long training times for new staff, and heavy monthly workloads; the department proposed prioritized IT and customer‑service investments to address the strain.
Department of Health and Human Services staff told the House Finance Committee on March 3 that the field operations arm of the Bureau of Family Assistance is under significant workload pressure and needs investments in technology and customer service capacity.
"These folks are processing over 8,000, on average, new applications," Karen Hebert said while summarizing field operations workload. She said the bureau also handles roughly 91,000 documents scanned and indexed per month, receives about 29,000 inbound calls monthly through its tier‑1 vendor call center and makes over 26,000 case updates per month.
Officials described two structural challenges: high vacancy and training time, and the need for targeted IT enhancements. The bureau reported a roughly 23% vacancy rate in field operations; many current staff are trainees and the department said it takes nine to…
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