Episode # 35: Dennis Blazey
Welcome to our latest edition of WonkCast: People Power Policy.
Financing is the foundation of policy reform. Today’s guest thinks our conversations about it need to get more entrepreneurial, starting with a focus on “bed days”.
For 24 years, Dennis Blazey was the Budget & Fiscal Officer for the Office of Children and Family Services at the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services.
He was integrated into the program office, developing and managing the budgets for Ohio’s child welfare, child care, social services, and adult protective services programs.
Whether you’ve met him or not, his ideas have shaped your conversations about child welfare financing policy; from his central role shaping the Title IV-E waiver program to his impact on state and federal discussions since retiring in 2007.
What stood out most is how his perspective on financing policy is fundamentally about visionary leadership.
Rather than asking what federal funding allows, he urges state leaders to experiment based on their vision for impact, without waiting for permission to innovate.
We talked about the limits of incentives, what he sees as the enemy of child welfare reform, and why the “bed day” is central to his prevention financing approach.
If the uncertainty and fiscal pressures of this moment seem to be impeding your space to think creatively about deeper reform, you won’t want to miss this.
