I. The general court recognizes:
(a) That children are the future of New Hampshire.
(b) That prevention and early intervention services to prospective parents, parents with very young children, and adolescents who will inevitably become parents have a positive effect on their own and their children’s wholesome development and success.
(c) That New Hampshire cannot afford the enormous human and financial costs associated with child abuse and neglect, low birth weight babies, and poor school performance which crisis management efforts in many cases and in the long run can neither remedy nor alleviate.
(d) That, as programs in many states around the country and in other nations have demonstrated, investment in prevention and early intervention services save future costs, including the costs of lost productivity and lost taxes, by reducing the need for corrective programs, incarceration, out-of-home placements, special education, and other remedial services particularly for disadvantaged families and families with young children who are at risk medically, socially, and educationally.
(e) That primary prevention and family support services are most effectively provided at the community level with coordination, encouragement, and financial help from the state.
(f) That public expectations of government performance are rising, as are demands for reducing both public and social costs, and that taxpayers increasingly want social programs in particular to be delivered more effectively, to be more efficient and responsive, and to demonstrate measurable progress in improving both individual and community wellbeing.
II. The intent of this act is to encourage, facilitate, and promote primary prevention and early intervention efforts of the state and local communities by creating and supporting a formal network of family resource centers as the basis for moving the state toward a more comprehensive strategy to improve the health and wellbeing of New Hampshire’s children and families.
Source. 1999, 276:1, eff. July 1, 1999. 2015, 117:1, eff. Aug. 7, 2015.