Legal Updates and Reminders

Weekly Email 11/25/20

• If Participants change their address, exit or transfer prior to their required court hearing, it is
imperative that you alert your legal team


Weekly Email 11/3/20

• As a reminder, please ensure all correspondence regarding Participants remains professional and
factual. This includes texts, emails and activity logs both directly with the Participants or internally
between staff members. Please understand, any of this type of correspondence will need to be
produced if a subpoena is issued. It does not matter if you use you use your personal cell phone or an
agency cell phone in the course of your work; all information pertaining to a Participant can be
requested via subpoena.
• If you receive any subpoenas, signed releases of information or any other requests for program or
Participant information from an attorney or law firm, send those immediately to your Regional
Coordinator and/or ODJFS Policy Developer. You cannot release any Participant information until any
request has been vetted by the ODJFS legal team.


Weekly Email 11/4/20

•Starting immediately, our legal team will be entering the SACWIS activity logs for you indicating the
required paperwork was sent to the court at least 14 days prior to the scheduled hearing. They have
received guidance on how to code the activity logs. A few other reminders:
o Your legal team also needs to know when Participants transfer or if their address changes
o You should also be checking SACWIS to ensure the activity logs have been entered when
getting close to 14 days prior to the hearing. If one happens to be missing, please send the
legal team a quick email to resolve the issue.
o Also, don't forget to reach out to the legal team if a Participant is approaching the time when a
Best Interest or Reasonable Efforts hearing needs to happen and you haven't received any
correspondence from them regarding the hearing.

Weekly Email 10/13/20

• Process/Timing Change: To comply with State rule and the State Hearings Process, we need to make
a change to when Notices of Termination (NOT) are either mailed or delivered to Participants.
Moving forward all NOT's must be mailed or delivered to Participants fifteen (15) calendar days prior
to the termination date indicated on the Notice of Ineligibility (NOI). If you have any questions about
this please reach out to us.
o If the 15th day falls on a weekend, the NOT must be mailed or delivered on the Friday before
o If the Participant regains eligibility during the fifteen (15) day period prior to termination, simply
invalidate the NOT and move forward
o Do not terminate or end date anything in SACWIS until the actual NOI/NOT effective date
done
o Enter an activity log indicating when the NOT was sent or delivered
o Enter another activity log if the Participant becomes eligible and the NOT is being invalidated
o For Participants turning 21/aging out a NOT at 60 days prior to their 21st birthday is all that
needs to be done
o The Participant still has 15 days from the day the NOT was mailed or delivered to file an appeal
and receive benefits -- this has not changed. The 15 days just occurs before the NOT date now,
not after.
 If the Participant files an appeal between the time they receive the NOT and the
termination effective date, but becomes eligible prior to the termination effective
date they should be instructed to withdraw the appeal
 If the Participant files an appeal between the time they receive the NOT and
termination effective date, but does not become eligible prior to the termination
effective date, the same process we have now is still in place
 If the Participant is terminated and has filed an appeal, but reenrolls before their
hearing, they should be instructed to withdraw the appeal