The Division of Children, Youth and Families is the state administered child welfare services agency responsible for developing the Child and Family Services Plan and administering the title IV-B programs under the plan. The Division provides child protective services; services within the Promoting Safe and Stable Families program; family support, preservation, and reunification services; family foster care and kinship care services; services to promote the safety, permanence, and well-being of children with foster and adoptive families; adoption promotion and support services; and health care services for children in out-of-home care.

A landmark assessment of infrastructure needs in Arizona was produced by the L. William Seidman Research Institute in May 2008 for the Arizona Investment Council (AIC): "Infrastructure Needs and Funding Alternatives for Arizona: 2008-2032", that addressed infrastructure needs in four categories: energy, telecommunications, transportation, and water and wastewater. The information from the AIC report is a major input to the report that follows. Other types of infrastructure — most notably education, health care, and public safety — also are analyzed here to provide a more complete picture of infrastructure needs in Arizona. The goals of this report are to place Arizona’s infrastructure needs into national and historical contexts, to identify the changing conditions in infrastructure provision that make building Arizona’s infrastructure in the future a more problematic proposition than in the past, and to provide projections of the possible costs of providing infrastructure in Arizona over the next quarter century.

Arizona faces some big challenges if it is to compete regionally, nationally and globally for the cutting-edge jobs that will help determine our economic future. As hard as state and community leaders are working, the report suggests that Arizona needs even more participation in economic development leadership, more collaboration among economic development groups and a greater sense of urgency. This report identifies a number of important issues that are key to advancing economic development in Arizona.