All Children - All Families National Advisory Council
Members of the All Children - All Families National Advisory Council serve as key advisors in the development and implementation of the All Children - All Families initiative and provide leadership in educating the broader child welfare community about the importance of supporting LGBT families in every aspect of practice.
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Susan Badeau
Director of Cross Systems Integration, Knowledge ManagementCasey Family Programs
Susan Badeau has been a child welfare professional for thirty years. Currently the Director of the Cross Systems Integration team within the Knowledge Management department of Casey Family Programs, Sue has been a child welfare policy consultant for a decade. In recent years, Ms. Badeau also served as the Executive Director of the Philadelphia Children’s Commission (focused on all aspects of children’s health and well-being in the city of Philadelphia) and as the Deputy Director of the Pew Commission on Children in Foster Care. She has also worked in direct services at both the casework and supervisory levels in adoption and foster care in both public and private agencies. She has developed curricula on many topics used to prepare professional child welfare staff, adoptive and foster parents, judges, attorneys and youth. She also writes extensively on topics related to children, particularly those with special needs and is a frequent speaker at state, regional and national conferences.
Active in community efforts on behalf of children and families with special needs at many levels, Sue has particular passion and expertise around a number of topic areas, including achieving permanence for older adolescents, the importance of the sibling bond, the impact of adoption and foster care on children’s development, the lifelong value of birth family connections for adopted children, and spiritual development for children in adoption and foster care. In addition, she has a strong belief that the multiple systems in which children and families become involved – child welfare, courts, education, mental health, physical health, developmental disabilities, etc – must learn to better communicate and collaborate to best serve children and families.
Sue and her husband, Hector, are the lifetime parents of twenty-two children, two by birth and twenty adopted. They have also served as foster parents for more than 50 children in three states, and as a host family for refugee youth from Sudan, Kosovo and Guatemala. Recently, their 29th grandchild and first 2 great-grandchildren were born. They have won numerous awards for their work, including being recognized by President Clinton with an “Adoption Excellence” award for their work on behalf of adoption and children in foster care.Bill Bettencourt
Senior Consultant, Pacific RegionAnnie E. Casey Foundation, Family to Family Initiative
Bill Bettencourt has 30 years of experience working in the social services field. He began his career as a social worker and assistant director for a parent-run community preschool. For over 26 years, he worked for the city and county of San Francisco, including five years with the criminal justice system and 21 years with the child welfare system. For his last four years in child welfare, he served as the director. For two years, he was the program officer with the Stuart Foundation and he actively serves on boards and committees of numerous local, state and national organizations. He is currently the senior consultant for The Annie E. Casey Foundation (AECF) and is the lead in the Family to Family (F2F) Pacific Region (California, Alaska and Washington). Bettencourt received his Bachelor of Arts degree from SF State and his Master of Arts degree from the University of San Francisco.
Maris H. Blechner
Executive DirectorFamily Focus Adoption Services
Maris H. Blechner, M Ed, LCSW, is the executive director of FAMILY FOCUS ADOPTION SERVICES, a twenty-two year old, non-traditional, high-energy-level New York State adoption agency that she helped found, and whose mission is the successful adoption of older children and youth languishing in the foster care systems around us. An educator by original profession, she is an adoptive parent, a birth parent, and an internationally respected speaker and trainer on child welfare and adoption issues.
Maris describes herself as a "grass roots" child advocate who has been around for a long time, starting in adoptive parent and foster children's rights organizations, and someone who believes strongly in the power of the individual to make significant change. Since FAMILY FOCUS is so much of her life, you can learn about her by looking at the agency web site: www.familyfocusadoption.org.
Madelyn Freundlich
Child Welfare ConsultantExcal Consulting Partners
Madelyn Freundlich is an internationally recognized scholar and child welfare expert. She formerly served as General Counsel and Director of Child Welfare Services for the Child Welfare League of America, Associate Director of Planning for the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, Executive Director for the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute, and Policy Director for Children’s Rights. In these capacities, she worked with public and private child welfare agencies and organizations across the country, providing consultation and training and developing practice, program, policy and research initiatives that have gained national and international recognition.
Ms. Freundlich has published extensively on child welfare issues and has developed strong collaborative relationships with child welfare, mental health, medical, legal and research professionals. Her publications range from issues of international market dynamics in adoptions to best practices in protecting the best interests of youth leaving the foster care system. She has served on the editorial boards of leading child welfare journals including Child Welfare, Adoption Quarterly and Adoption and Fostering. She has mentored scholars, policy makers, and practitioners on their research, publication, and practice efforts.
She has developed and led the implementation of numerous efforts to define best practices in child welfare and to develop strong programming to meet the needs of vulnerable children and families. She has trained a broad range of organizations and individuals across the United States on child welfare issues and has worked with organizations to develop customized training on child welfare practice and administrative issues. Now in private consultation practice, her current projects include consultation with Casey Family Services in the planning of a national convening on permanency for older children and youth; with the Home At Last initiative of the Pew Charitable Trusts to ensure implementation of the recommendations of the Pew Commission on Children in Foster Care regarding court improvements; and with the Child Welfare League of America as the principal writer of the revised standards of excellence for the delivery of health care services for children in out of home care.
Ms. Freundlich has presented to national and international audiences on both child welfare practice and legal issues. She has presented at national conferences sponsored by the Child Welfare League of America, the North American Council on Adoptable Children, and the National Association of Counsel for Children and at special conferences on national and international foster care and adoption issues. She has also been quoted in stories featured in the mainstream media, including the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times and NBC Nightly News. For her efforts to improve policies and practices for vulnerable children, she has received numerous awards and recognitions, including an Adoption Activist of the Year Award from the North American Council on Adoptable Children and an Adoption Excellence Award from the US Department of Health and Human Services.
Ms. Freundlich holds master degrees in social work (MSW, Louisiana State University) and public health (MPH, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill) and two degrees in law (JD, University of Houston and LL.M., Georgetown University).
Janice Goldwater
Founder and Executive DirectorAdoptions Together
Janice Goldwater is the founder and executive director of Adoptions Together, a child placement agency licensed in Maryland, DC and Virginia that finds adoptive parents for children nationwide. A social worker by trade, Goldwater established Adoptions Together in 1990 in response to her frustration with serious gaps in the child welfare system. She rooted the agency in a firm commitment to working with children traditionally underserved by the private sector.
Adoptions Together provides opportunities and support to all children in need, regardless of age, race or physical or mental health challenges, and provides educational programs and behavioral health services to strengthen families as children mature. Adoptions Together serves children born in the local community, those in overseas orphanages and those in our country’s foster care system. Since 1990, it has settled more than 2,600 children in permanent, loving homes.
Each year, the agency’s Center for Adoptive Families provides post-adoption support services to hundreds of adoptive families, and provides training to professionals across the DC region on a wide variety of issues that impact the lives of adopted children and their families.
Goldwater is married, the mother of four children and resides in Silver Spring, Md. She received her master’s in social work in 1980 from the George Warren Brown School of Social Work at Washington University in St Louis, Mo. She began her career in community mental health and transitioned to child welfare in the early 80s. Since that time, she has dedicated herself to creating and implementing innovative programs that find permanent homes for children and support for their families across the lifespan. In 2001, Goldwater was honored with a Congressional Coalition on Adoption “Angel in Adoption” award. She currently serves on several boards of directors, including ATTACH, the Adoption Exchange Association and the All Children-All Families initiative of the Human Rights Campaign Foundation.
Jill Jacobs
Executive DirectorFamily Builders
Jill Jacobs is the executive director of Family Builders, an adoption and permanency agency based in Oakland, Calif. She has a Masters in Health Services Administration and 25 years of experience in the management and leadership of non-profit, community-based, multi-cultural health and social services organizations. Jacobs is a leader, trainer and advocate on behalf of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. She is highly committed to the goal that no youth leaves foster care without a permanent family. Jacobs is the mother of two daughters via adoption.
John Levesque
Board of Directors/Executive CommitteeNorth American Council on Adoptable Children
John Levesque is a licensed social worker with 31 years experience in public child welfare, both in administration and direct practice. His primary expertise is adoption related services.
Levesque is on the executive committee for the board of directors of the North American Council of Adoptable Children. NACAC promotes and supports permanent families for children and youth in the U.S. and Canada who have been in care—especially those in foster care and those with special needs. To achieve this mission, NACAC focuses its program services in four areas: public policy advocacy, parent leadership capacity building, education and information sharing, and adoption support.
Levesque is employed as the Director of Training and Technical Assistance for the National Child Welfare Resource Center for Adoption whose mission is to assist States, Tribes, Territories and other federally funded child welfare agencies in building their capacity to ensure the safety, well being, and permanency of abused and neglected children through adoption and post legal adoption services program planning, policy development and practice. He also serves as the NRC liaison to the National Association of State Adoption Programs, Inc. whose purpose is to provide a forum in which State Adoption Program Managers can pool their expertise and to promote networking activities as an association with other direct child welfare entities and individual professionals so that each state can develop and maintain an efficient, state-of-the-art adoption program.
Previously, as the Adoption Program Manager for the Maine DHHS, he developed and implemented a public/private partnership that is the lead “resource family” recruitment agency in Maine. He also designed and implemented a federal child welfare demonstration post legal adoption services project. Under his leadership, Maine increased adoptions by over 200% and received an adoption excellence award. Levesque co-led the effort to streamline the dual tracks of adoptive and foster family training/study process into a unified, comprehensive and gender-neutral process, along with creating a state-wide cross agency collaborative involving public, private and tribal agencies.
Ernesto Loperena
Executive DirectorNew York Council on Adoptable Children
Ernesto Loperena is the executive director of the New York Council on Adoptable Children (COAC), the first organization in New York City to declare that “Every child, no matter how old and regardless of physical, mental or emotional handicapping conditions of whatever race or creed, is adoptable.” Since 1970 COAC has helped place over 2,500 children in permanent, loving and nurturing homes. Loperena’s major contributions at COAC include the city-wide expansion of the African-American and Hispanic Child Adoption Program and his pioneering work in establishing New York City’s first private program for children orphaned by AIDS.
As president of the North American Council on Adoptable Children (NACAC), a non-profit, broad-based coalition of volunteer adoptive parent and citizen advocacy groups from the United States and Canada, Loperena led the organization’s revitalization from 1986 through 1990. He received their highest award in 1994 for those efforts.
Loperena has served on numerous advisory commissions regarding child welfare on the local, state and federal levels. He was a public member of the U.S. State Department Delegation to The Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption held in the Netherlands in 1994. He has testified before the House Select Committee on Children, Youth and Families; before the Joint Congressional Committee on Adoption and before the New York State legislature on adoption issues. Loperena also facilitated the National Latino Welfare Advocacy Group, funded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, whose ultimate goal is to reform the foster care and adoption systems as they impact on Latino children nationwide.
Loperena has served on the Advisory Board of New York City’s Commissioner of Administration for Children’s Services (ACS) and is currently president of the Board of Directors of Voice For Adoption (VFA); vice president of the Adoption Exchange Association (AEA) Board of Directors; member of the Board of Directors of Citizens Committee for Children; member of the Board of Directors and chair of the Strategic Planning Committee of Leake and Watts Services for Children; and chairperson of the Board of Directors of the Latino Commission on AIDS (LCOA). Loperena was also appointed by ACS Commissioner John Mattingly to serve on his HIV/AIDS Health Care Advisory Panel in 2005.
Penelope (Penny) L. Maza, Ph.D.
Child Welfare ConsultantPenny Maza has been working in the child welfare field for over thirty years, primarily as a senior staff member and as a manager in the federal government. She has also served as the Research Director of the Child Welfare League of America. Recently retired from federal service, she is currently providing consultation to a number of organizations and child welfare agencies. Throughout her career she has emphasized work designed to facilitate permanency, primarily adoption, for children in foster care. Her career has involved a variety of activities related to both adoption and foster care including research, program evaluation and innovation, quality assurance, and analyses of administrative and other data sources. Her work, including over 50 publications, has been incorporated into federal legislation and has influenced the operation of State adoption programs. Her most recent activities have involved analyses of Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (AFCARS) data to inform child welfare policy and practice. She holds a Ph.D. in sociology.
Ann McCabe
Family Therapist and Child Welfare ConsultantAnn McCabe is a licensed Marriage/Family Therapist and has worked in child welfare for more than 20 years. In addition to her private clinical practice, she is presently serving as trainer with New Jersey Child Welfare Training Partnership, whose charge is to bring a new Case Practice Model to its leadership and casework staff.
McCabe also served as director of program development and evaluation at the National Adoption Center (NAC). During her nine-year tenure at NAC, McCabe was responsible for launching an innovative adoption support website for families, which included a unique home-study training curricula. She served on the technical team that developed AdoptUSKids and provided creative leadership for the first adoption website aimed at children 8-12 years old, The Adoption Clubhouse.
As a licensed therapist, McCabe specializes in adoption/foster care and has written many related articles including, “Adoption, Reworking the Burden of Split Loyalties” (monograph and teaching tape). As an adult adoptee, she brings an increased sensitivity to her work and writings. A parent to two adult daughters, and she and her partner of 23 years share the delightful task of being grandmothers to nine grandchildren.
Nathan Monell
Chief Executive OfficerFoster Care Alumni of America
Nathan Monell is the executive director of Foster Care Alumni of America (FCAA), a national association whose mission is to connect the alumni community and to transform policy and practice, ensuring opportunities for people in and from foster care. FCAA is building a network of people across the nation who will give voice to their experience of foster care and use their combined voices to support one another and change the foster care system for the better. FCAA is proud to be a supporter of All Children - All Families, knowing from experience that all children deserve a home, a true place of belonging.
FCAA was launched in 2004 and opened its membership for the first time in late 2006. Membership is open to alumni (any adult who experienced foster care of any kind in their childhood), allies who support the alumni movement and organizations with a vested interest in improving outcomes for children in care and foster care alumni. FCAA’s ever-growing chapter network provides opportunity for local connection and statewide advocacy.
Monell has over 20 years experience leading non-profit organizations in the areas of executive management, human resources, development, marketing and public relations. Prior to joining FCAA he served nine years as executive director of the Northern Virginia AIDS Ministry (NOVAM), where he nearly tripled the budget, increased net assets by nearly 500% and doubled staff size to 20 employees. Before leading NOVAM, Monell was executive director of Federal City Performing Arts; director of marketing and external relations of the Knoxville Museum of Art; director of marketing, development and public relations of Overlook Center, Inc. and director of human resources of the Job Training and Employment Corporation.
Monell holds a certificate in nonprofit management from Georgetown University; a M.A. in communication studies (organizational communications/behavior) from the University of Michigan; and a B.A. in speech from Cornerstone University. Among his many volunteer leadership interests, Monell serves as the 2007-2008 chair of the Board of Regents for Leadership Arlington.
He and his partner, Shepherd Faught, have two adopted children and reside in Falls Church, Va. Their family has been featured in several media stories including an Associated Press story on employer benefits for adoptive gay families.
J.Toni Oliver
Founder and CEOROOTS, Inc.
J. Toni Oliver is president and CEO of ROOTS, Inc., the first adoption agency in Georgia to focus solely on improving adoption opportunities for African American children. In addition, Oliver is president of J.T. Oliver & Associates, a child welfare training and consultation firm based in Atlanta, Ga.
Oliver incorporated ROOTS on April 21, 1992 to address what she felt was a largely unmet, un-addressed social problem – the growing number of African American children drifting aimlessly in foster care. Currently, ROOTS serves more than 100 families per month who are actively engaged in the adoption process and has placed nearly 400 children with permanent adoptive families.
In 1999, Oliver took a two-year sabbatical from ROOTS to take a position as program manager for adoptions with the Child and Family Services Agency in the District of Columbia. Under her supervision, finalized adoption services were improved and 600 adoptions were finalized, representing a 250% increase in finalized placements for the District of Columbia.
As an independent consultant and trainer with J.T. Oliver & Associates, Oliver develops training programs for public and private child welfare agencies that focus on adoptive parent recruitment, family assessment and child placement services, as they relate to children in the custody of public agencies, particularly children of color. In this capacity, she has provided training, consultation and keynote speeches for public and private agencies, parent and community groups and professional organizations in over twenty states.
For 3 ½ years, Oliver served as director of consultation and training services for the Child Welfare Institute (CWI) in Atlanta. Prior to CWI, she was the associate director of training and consultation for the National Adoption Center in Philadelphia, Pa. She has been a board member and advisory council member for numerous national and local organizations, including One Church, One Child, North American Council on Adoptable Children, University of Georgia’s Federal Child Welfare Training Grant and has served as co-chair of the NABSW National Foster Care & Adoption Task Force for ten years. She has received numerous recognitions and awards for her work in the field of child welfare. In 2004, she received the Black Administrator of the Year Award from the Black Administrators in Child Welfare. In September of 2004, Oliver taught a three week course on non-profit management at the Georgian Institute of Public Affairs in Tbilisi, Republic of Georgia for the University of Georgia’s Institute of Governmental Affairs. In 2005, Oliver was selected as the 2006 Alumni Fellow for Temple University’s School of Social Administration.
She is a member of New Life Presbyterian Church, Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. and the proud parent of two daughters. Oliver holds a Bachelor of Arts in sociology from Bennett College and a master’s in social work from Temple University.
Adam Pertman
Executive DirectorEvan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute
Adam Pertman is executive director of the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute, the pre-eminent research and policy organization in its field. Pertman is also author of Adoption Nation: How the Adoption Revolution is Transforming America (Basic Books, 2000), reviewed as “the most important book ever written on the subject.” He has written many chapters and articles in other books, scholarly journals and popular publications. He was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize for writing about adoption while at the Boston Globe, where he was a senior journalist for more than two decades before embarking on his current career, and has received numerous honors for his work. Pertman lectures nationally and has appeared on various television programs including Oprah, Today and Nightline. He and his wife, Judy Baumwoll, live in Massachusetts with their two children (both adopted): Zachary, 13, and Emilia, 10.
Maria Quintanilla
Executive DirectorLatino Family Institute
Maria Quintanilla is executive director of Latino Family Institute, Inc. (LFI). LFI, formally known as Hispanic Family Institute, was the first Latino adoption agency in California. LFI specializes in providing adoption and foster care services to the Latino community. LFI is the recipient of state funding to provide Latino kinship adoptions. LFI is the current recipient of two federal grants; the Infant Adoption Awareness Training Program (IATP) for health care providers and the Abandoned Infants Assistance Program (AIA) providing comprehensive services to families affected by substance abuse, HIV and AIDS. LFI is the past recipient of two federally funded grants specifically to recruit Latino families interested in adopting Latino siblings, males and children 10 years of age and older.
Quintanilla obtained her A.A. degree from Mount Saint Mary’s College, her bachelor’s in social work from California State University, Los Angeles and her master’s in social welfare from UC Berkeley and studied social welfare in Mexico at Universidad de Guadalajara. She is a licensed clinical social worker, a certified bereavement counselor, MAPP and PRIDE Trainer. Quintanilla is a recognized leader in the field of Latino adoption and foster care issues. Quintanilla has ten years of medical social work experience specializing in maternal child health and the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). She has trained medical personnel in the areas of adoption and identifying child abuse and domestic violence in a hospital setting. She has also conducted trainings, statewide, nationally and in Puerto Rico, at the request of the State Department of Social Services Adoptions Branch, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) – Administration of Children and Families (ACF), the Child Welfare League of America (CWLA) and the California Latino Social Work Network. Quintanilla serves as a board member to the National Council of Latino Executives, the Latino Advisory Board for CWLA, the Latino Advisory Group for Wendy’s Dave Thomas Foundation, the Adoption Exchange Association (AEA), the North American Council on Adoptable Children (NACAC), and the All Children-All Families national advisory council of the Human Rights Campaign Foundation. She is a consultant for the National Resource Center for Recruitment & Retention of Foster & Adoptive Parents of AdoptUSKids and the National Child Welfare Resource Center for Adoption. Quintanilla also serves as a child welfare consultant to various Spanish language media networks in California and nationally.
Karey Scheyd
Trainer/ConsultantKarey Scheyd has worked in foster care and adoption since 1999 and has contributed to the recruitment of thousands of families over that time. She launched her career at a voluntary foster care agency in New York City in the role of Homefinder and Foster Parent Recruitment & Training Coordinator. In 2002 she transferred to the City’s Administration for Children’s Services and eventually served as ACS’s Deputy Director of Foster & Adoptive Parent Recruitment. In this position Karey was responsible for managing a number of programs including: Wednesday’s Child, Wendy’s Wonderful Kids, Heart Gallery NYC, Families For Teens Speakers’ Bureau, and the Parent Recruitment Hotline.
Karey has a Master of Public Administration from the NYU Wagner School of Public Service with a specialization in Public and Nonprofit Management. In her work experience she has enjoyed opportunities to generate an array of communications and marketing materials, participate in branding efforts and strategic planning, organize citywide events, and manage the project development, budgeting and reporting associated with large grants. As an independent contractor since late 2006, she has provided on-site and long-distance consultation, training, technical assistance, grant-writing, and curriculum development for an array of nonprofit organizations.
Karey has been a core member of several national and New York City-based networks, workgroups and coalitions dedicated to serving LGBTQ adults and youth in the foster care system. In 2005 she was profiled in Gay Parent Magazine as a leader in NYC’s foster care and adoption community, and served on ACS’s strategic planning committee for LGBTQ services. Since 2007 Karey has served on the advisory council to the Human Rights Campaign’s All Children – All Families initiative, which aims to promote culturally competent practices at child welfare organizations and further engage prospective foster/adoptive parents from the LGBT community. She has facilitated workshops at numerous local and national conferences, including the CWLA Finding Better Ways conference in November 2006 and Wendy’s Wonderful Kids Summit in May 2008.
Andre Wade
Foster/Adoptive Parent RecruiterClark County Department of Family Services
André Wade was born and raised in Las Vegas, Nevada. He earned a scholarship to the University of Nevada Las Vegas (UNLV) where he earned a Bachelor's Degree in Psychology with a minor in English. While at UNLV he was on the academic honor roll, earned program recognition for academic achievements and was President of the Psychology Club. He was part of a research team that presented research findings at two major west-coast psychology conferences. Also, he was nominated for an academic scholarship by an English professor during his last semester of school. After graduating he moved to Los Angeles, California and began his career in social services. His career in social services offered him the opportunity to work as a counselor, a Mental Health Day Rehab case aide, a child and family specialist for a wrap-a-round program, provide case management to developmentally disabled school age children and provide case management to families in Child Welfare. In his current position as a Foster/Adoptive Parent Recruiter for Clark County Department of Family Services (CCDFS) he works to match children with adoptive parent resources and to also recruit for LGBT families in the community. With help from HRC Mr. Wade connected CCDFS with HRC’s All Children-All Families initiative that will help CCDFS recruit, support and retain LGBT foster and adoptive parent resources through the licensing and matching process. Furthermore, he is in the process of developing an agency wide diversity training that will cover LGBT topics and he is developing a LGBT Youth group for children in foster care. Currently Mr. Wade is earning a Master’s degree in Public Administration and is on the local steering committee for HRC as a diversity co-chair. He enjoys traveling, reading, writing, physical fitness and spending time with family and friends.
Diane Wagner
Division Chief, Adoption and Permanency ResourcesCounty of Los Angeles, Department of Children and Family Services
Ms. Wagner has worked in the field of child welfare for over 30 years. She has been a social worker and manager in a variety of areas of public child welfare. She has served in her current capacity as Division Chief of the Adoption and Permanency Resources Division, Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services for the past six years.
Under Ms. Wagner’s leadership, the Division has finalized an average of 2000 adoptions of dependent children each year. The Division has received three National Association of Counties (NACO) awards and an Adoption Excellence award. Ms. Wagner is a member of the California Permanency for Youth Task Force, Family Builder’s Network, California Child Welfare Directors Association Adoption Sub-Committee, the California Department of Social Services Permanency Sustainability Workgroup and the Southern California Adoption Managers Group.
John A. Wagner
DirectorCalifornia Department of Social Services
John A. Wagner was appointed Director of the California Department of Social Services by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in April 2007. With nearly two decades of experience in human services, he has served as senior policymaker and advisor to six gubernatorial administrations in Wisconsin and Massachusetts. As Director, Mr. Wagner is responsible for the operation of an annual budget in excess of $19 billion and more than 4,000 employees in a department that administers critical services to aid and protect California's most vulnerable populations including children, adults, elderly, and the disabled.
Most recently, Mr. Wagner concurrently served in the Massachusetts Executive Office of Health and Human Services as Assistant Secretary for Children, Youth and Families and as Commissioner for the Department of Transitional Assistance. He was responsible for policy and program coordination between four state agencies, overseeing the administration of cash assistance, shelter, and food programs and reforming agency programs for homeless families including establishing individual self-sufficiency plans. Previously, Mr. Wagner served as the Undersecretary and Chief of Staff in the Massachusetts Executive Office of Health and Human Services.
Mr. Wagner was an integral part of the design and implementation of welfare reform in Wisconsin, including the nation's first statewide replacement of the existing welfare system with "Wisconsin Works" model. In Massachusetts, he oversaw the development and implementation of innovative efforts to combat family homeless, increase access to the Food Stamp Program, and pilot interagency efforts to better serve low-income adults with disabilities.
Mr. Wagner holds a master's degree in public administration from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, a master's degree in public policy from Georgetown University and a bachelor's degree in political science and French from Marquette University.
