High-Performance Partnerships - National Academy of Public ...

“The Healthy Families Partnership heralded a
new way of doing business when it came to
serving and supporting families. Public and private
agencies pooled resources, redirected staff,
and created a new organization to respond to
the needs of young children and families. The
partnership shifted from responding to problems
to preventing problems through shifting
investment from service delivered to outcomes
achieved.”
Healthy Families Partnership (Hampton)
Partnership Characteristics
HFP’s mission is to ensure that “every child is
born healthy and enters school ready to learn.”
The partnership’s goals are to reduce the need
for intensive out-of-home treatment strategies
and increase the effectiveness of prevention and
early intervention. Through the latter, children
can have better health and education outcomes.
A formal partnership of public, private, and
nonprofit agencies was created to achieve these
goals. Its primary members include the city’s
departments of social services, health, and
libraries; the SENTARA health system and
other community hospital and health organizations;
and the nonprofit Center for Child
and Family Services. Each partner has defined
responsibilities. City agencies provide overall
coordination, funding, and substantial direct
service delivery. The hospital partners provide
resource support and participant referrals.
They also are instrumental in targeting clients
and outreach to permit early intervention for
newborns and their parents. The Center for
Child and Family Services provides counseling
opportunities for at-risk families and children.
Nonprofit and private investors contribute funding
and in-kind services and align their service
delivery activities with the partnership’s mission.
For example, hospitals integrate their Lamaze
training classes with HFP curricula. The hospitals
facilitate outreach to families and children
and maximize available training resources.
Hampton created this partnership using an
“investor model” where key decision-makers
serve on a steering committee. The model is
sensitive to customer needs and input, but
HFP is driven by the entities funding the services.
This emphasizes stakeholder action—not
necessarily consensus—making it imperative
to have the decision-makers actively engaged
in the partnership and its governance.
HFP employs two basic service strategies with
an array of individual programs.
• Healthy Start: a voluntary home visitation
program that offers family support services
and health case management from prebirth
to kindergarten
• Healthy Community: a variety of parent
education and support services offered to
Hampton families, including child birth
preparation, parental education classes, and
workshops; playgroups for parents and
young children; Young Family Centers in
public libraries that offer resource information,
reading opportunities, and pre-literacy
activities; Welcome Baby that gives parenting
and community information to new families;
Healthy Stages child development newsletters
that have age-specific information on child
growth and development; and Child Fair, a
community event focusing on health and
wellness screenings and community
resources for families and parental education.
The Healthy Start initiative is targeted to atrisk
families, while the Healthy Community
programs are open to all.
Results
HFP has done an excellent job of increasing
program participation and producing significant
results for its clients and the community
at large. This partnership was one of the factors
cited when the National Civic League designated
Hampton an “All American City” in
2002. Further, HFP reached an extraordinary
proportion of Hampton’s citizens during fiscal
year 2002.
• 30,000 out of 35,000 children under age 19
received services.
• 2,713 parents participated in parenting programs,
a 300 percent increase from 1999.
39 Powering the Future: High-Performance Partnerships