Summary

Implements Alaska Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP), the state's CCDF-funded child care subsidy program administered as Parents Achieving Self-Sufficiency (PASS) under the Alaska Department of Health, Division of Public Assistance, Child Care Program Office.

This PR covers PASS III (general subsidy population) and PASS II (12-month transitional post-ATAP), with the full provider rate matrix and Alaska IN! special-needs supplement.

Closes #8319

Regulatory Authority

• CCAP Policies and Procedures Manual (rev. Jan 2023) — 706 pages; primary operational manual for PASS I–IV
• Family Income & Contribution Schedule (FICS), rev. Feb 21, 2022 — current SMI thresholds + sliding-scale copay (2-page PDF, no page anchor)
• Provider Rate Schedule, rev. Dec 1, 2021 — full rate matrix by region × age group × provider type × care unit
• Alaska Statutes AS 47.25.001 – .095 (Day Care Assistance and Child Care Grants)
• Alaska Administrative Code 7 AAC 41:
  • 7 AAC 41.012 — PASS I–IV category structure
  • 7 AAC 41.060 — Alaska IN! special-needs supplemental rate
  • 7 AAC 41.300 — eligible family / residency / asset limit
  • 7 AAC 41.310 — eligible activities
  • 7 AAC 41.335 — family income contribution
  • 7 AAC 41.350 — eligible child
  • 7 AAC 41.360 — parent exceptions

Program Overview

• Administration: State-administered; CCDF/CCDBG-funded
• Income limit: 85% Alaska State Median Income (NOT FPG; FPG is used only for self-employment proration per Manual §4080-2 J 4)
• Categories implemented: PASS II (post-ATAP transitional) + PASS III (general subsidy)
• Categories excluded: PASS I (ATAP-bundled, covered by PASS III for income-eligible families); PASS IV (OCS protective services, custody status not tracked)
• Provider rate matrix: 29 rate regions × 4 age groups × 4 provider types × 4 care units (~1,500 cells)
• Family copay: sliding 0–9% of monthly income, 10 brackets keyed to % SMI band

Eligibility

Income & Copay Calculation

• 85% AK SMI threshold table (FICS Rev Feb 21, 2022 — 2-page PDF, no page anchor): 7 family-size rows with 100% SMI values $5,897 / $7,285 / $8,673 / $10,060 / $11,448 / $11,708 / $11,968. Helper variable ak_ccap_smi_threshold multiplies the family-size-indexed AK SMI by income/smi_rate.yaml (0.85).
• Sliding-scale copay (FICS): 10 brackets covering 0%, 1%, 2%, 3%, 4%, 5%, 6%, 7%, 8%, 9% of countable monthly income, keyed to the family's % SMI band. Cap = 9%. ak_ccap_copay (SPMUnit/MONTH) applies once at the family level (Manual §4080 — single copay covers all children).
• Counted earned income: employment_income, self_employment_income (adults only — child earned income excluded per Manual §4080-1 PDF p.203)
• Counted unearned income: child support received, alimony, Social Security, unemployment, veterans benefits, rental, pension (Manual §4080-3 PDF p.231)
• Excluded income: Alaska PFD, federal tax refunds, EITC, federal non-cash benefits (SNAP/WIC/Medicaid/Medicare), disaster relief, TA Diversion, in-kind support (Manual §4080-5 PDF p.248) — these variables are not in the adds lists, so they flow around CCAP countable income naturally
• Child support paid deduction (Manual §4080; 7 AAC 41.335): ak_ccap_child_support_paid_deduction subtracts legally-obligated payments to non-CCAP family members

Benefit Calculation

• Per-child benefit (ak_ccap_benefit_per_child, Person/MONTH):
  min(provider_charged_rate, state_max_provider_rate) − family_copay_share + special_needs_supplement
• State max provider rate (ak_ccap_max_provider_rate_per_child): looked up from rates/{provider_type}.yaml indexed by [care_unit][region][age_group]. Four provider files: licensed_center.yaml, licensed_group_home.yaml, licensed_home.yaml, approved_relative_in_home.yaml. Provider Rate Schedule rev. Dec 1, 2021.
• Family copay share: family copay divided by number of children in care (ak_ccap_dependents_in_care); applied once total per family (Manual §4080)
• Special-needs supplement (7 AAC 41.060, Alaska IN!): up to 3× the standard provider rate for disabled children under 13. ak_ccap_special_needs_supplement = (supplement_multiplier − 1) × standard_max_rate. The supplement is added OUTSIDE the min(charge, max_rate) cap per regulation wording ("in addition to").
• Anchorage rate exception (REQ-034, Rate Schedule p.1): no licensed group homes exist in Municipality of Anchorage; parameter file stores 0 for the ANCHORAGE column under licensed_group_home.
• Annual aggregator: ak_child_care_subsidies (SPMUnit/YEAR) sums the 12 monthly ak_ccap values; registered in gov.hhs.ccdf.child_care_subsidy_programs to feed the federal child_care_subsidies rollup.

Files Added

• Parameters (14 YAML files): policyengine_us/parameters/gov/states/ak/dpa/ccap/ (age_threshold, age_group, copay, eligibility, income/countable_income, rates, special_needs) + 1 line added to gov/hhs/ccdf/child_care_subsidy_programs.yaml
• Variables (29 Python files): 27 in policyengine_us/variables/gov/states/ak/dpa/ccap/ (benefit, copay, eligibility, income, rates) + 2 new ATAP common variables in policyengine_us/variables/gov/states/ak/dpa/atap/common/ (was_atap_recipient, months_since_atap_exit)
• Tests (24 YAML files): 22 in policyengine_us/tests/policy/baseline/gov/states/ak/dpa/ccap/ + 2 in .../ak/dpa/atap/common/; 120 total test cases (all passing)
• Changelog: changelog.d/ak-ccap.added.md

Total: 68 files, +7,846 lines.

Requirements Coverage

• 31 in-scope requirements, all covered with parameters/variables/tests
• 7 requirements documented as NOT-MODELED:
  • REQ-017 (catastrophic medical/dental deduction — specialized expense category not tracked)
  • REQ-018 (educational expense deduction — educational income not separately tracked from other income; net zero effect on countable income since both income and deduction would be omitted)
  • REQ-024 (job search — episodic activity state not simulated)
  • REQ-027 (jury duty — episodic substitute)
  • REQ-028 (CC24 incapacity status — distinct from is_disabled, not tracked)
  • REQ-037 (PASS IV / OCS protective services — custody status not tracked)
  • REQ-038 (PASS I / ATAP-bundled — covered by PASS III for income-eligible families)

Not Modeled (by design)

Historical Notes

• FICS effective Feb 21, 2022 (current) — implementation uses this revision only per user-confirmed scope
• An earlier FICS effective Aug 31, 2019 is available but not backdated in this PR
• Provider Rate Schedule effective Dec 1, 2021 (current) — single era covers 2021-12-01 onward
• 7 AAC 41.012 (PASS structure) originally effective June 23, 2006; amended January 5, 2017

Test Plan

• 120 unit + integration tests pass (CCAP + ATAP common)
• make format clean
• CI passes