Chaired by the Special Secretary of the Governor's Office for Children, Maryland's Children's Cabinet is charged with coordinating cross-agency strategies to support children and families and reduce the number of children living in poverty. By working together, agencies will increase access to and improve education, health, social services, workforce, housing, and community development while ensuring that systems are child centered and family focused, based on community strengths and needs.
The Children's Cabinet works closely with Local Management Boards, which use the Results-Based Accountability framework to identify, evaluate, and develop the programs and strategies needed to address local community needs and provide resources for children and families in their jurisdiction. Local Management Boards bring together local child-serving agencies, child providers, youth, families, and communities to make decisions about priorities and how resources are deployed to address local needs.
In fiscal year 2024, the Maryland's Children's Cabinet provided more than $22 million from the Children's Cabinet Interagency Fund to Local Management Boards supporting 136 community-based programs focused on improving outcomes for Maryland's children and their families.
Children's Cabinet Membership
Carmel Martin, Special Secretary
Governor's Office for Children (GOC)
www.goc.maryland.gov
Yaakov “Jake” Weissmann, Acting Secretary
Department of Budget and Management (DBM)
www.dbm.maryland.gov
Carol A. Beatty, Secretary
Department of Disabilities (MDOD)
www.mdod.maryland.gov
Meena Seshamani, MD, Ph.D, Secretary
Department of Health (MDH)
www.health.maryland.gov
Rafael López, Secretary
Department of Human Services (DHS)
www.dhs.maryland.gov
Betsy Fox Tolentino, Acting Secretary
Department of Juvenile Services (DJS)
www.djs.maryland.gov
Carey M. Wright, Ed.D., State Superintendent of Schools
Maryland State Department of Education (MSDE)
www.marylandpublicschools.org
Sanjay Rai, Ph.D. , Secretary
Higher Education Commission (MHEC)
www.mhec.maryland.gov
Portia Wu, Secretary
Department of Labor (MDL)
www.labor.maryland.gov
Jacob Day, Secretary
Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD)
www.dhcd.maryland.gov
Jonny Dorsey , Acting Secretary
Department of Service and Civic Innovation (DSCI)
www.dsci.maryland.gov
Katie Savage, Secretary
Department of Information Technology (DoIT)
www.doit.maryland.gov
Reports and Publications
Legislatively required reports and/or publications produced by, or submitted to, the Governor’s Office for Children are accessible using the links below. For historical reports, please refer to the Department of Legislative Services’ Legislative Library at: https://mlsd.ent.sirsi.net/client/en_US/default/?dt=list.
Children's Cabinet Annual Report
Children's Cabinet Strategic Plan
State of Maryland Out-of-Home Placement Report and Data Dashboard
For more information regarding out-of-home placements, out-of-state placements, one-day counts, and costs associated with out-of-home placements and to view the publicly available dashboard and its interactive capabilities, please visit the Maryland State Out-of-Home Placement Data Dashboard.
