Rethinking Tennessee’s Safety Net with Commissioner Clarence Carter
Tennessee Commissioner of Human Services Clarence Carter joins Signature Required to discuss what’s working, what isn’t, and what needs to change about the systems designed to serve Tennessee’s most vulnerable. Drawing on 35 years in public service, Carter shares his vision for a safety net that helps people move beyond dependency, strengthens families, and creates a path toward lasting stability.
About Commissioner Clarence Carter
Commissioner Clarence H. Carter leads the Tennessee Department of Human Services, bringing more than 35 years of public service experience across the federal, state, and local levels. Throughout his career, he has served under two presidents, four governors, and a mayor, working to rethink how public assistance can help individuals and families move beyond vulnerability toward greater independence. In Tennessee, Carter is leading efforts to transform the state’s safety net by focusing not only on delivering services, but on creating pathways toward long-term stability and opportunity. He is also the author of Our Net Has Holes in It, which explores how America’s safety net can better serve those who need it most.
Rethinking the Safety Net
America’s safety net was created to help people through seasons of vulnerability, but Commissioner Clarence Carter believes the system should do more than provide temporary assistance. It should help people move toward greater independence and opportunity. Drawing on more than 35 years in public service, Carter is working to shift the focus from simply delivering benefits to helping individuals and families overcome the challenges that made those benefits necessary in the first place.
Resources
Tennessee Department of Human Services
Our Net Has Holes in It
Connect with Commissioner Carter on LinkedIn
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Spencer Patton: [00:00:00] Welcome to Signature Required. It is intended for Tennesseans by Tennesseans
Commissioner Clarence Carter, welcome to Signature Required.
Clarence Carter: Uh, thanks so much for having me.
Spencer Patton: You run the Tennessee Department of Human Services.
You have been a public servant for over 35 years. Two presidents, four governors, and a mayor. We are really thrilled to have you in our studio.
Clarence Carter: It, it is my honor and privilege to be here with you today.
Spencer Patton: So after 35 years of public service, particularly in a space like human services, I kind of have this movie trailer in my mind where the screen is just pure darkness, and someone's like, "You know, I'm in a, I'm in a dark place right now."
And your deep voice comes [00:01:00] in and says, "You don't know darkness." "I, I have seen darkness."
Carli Patton: That's it. What a vi- what a visual. That's it.
Spencer Patton: Uh... And the, I say that because you are in equal parts, like some of the most unbelievable, heartbreaking stories that you could make every single person listening cry and just question like, "What are we even doing here?"
At the same time, you have been placed in a position of helping the people that absolutely need it the most.
Clarence Carter: That, that's correct.
Spencer Patton: And so let's just start there. After 35 years, like how do you get out of bed in the morning and say, "I'm gonna give it my all today"? 'Cause I think a lot of people, especially in human services and dealing with the safety nets that our society has, you, you could not be blamed at all for just saying, "I, I, I give [00:02:00] up."
Clarence Carter: S- so Spencer, the other side of that- Vulnerability, that fragility, those sad stories, okay, are the inspirational ones as folks are able to grow beyond that vulnerability. And when you see an instance where the light comes on and freedom is the result, that's the kinds of things that make you get up in, in the morning.
You know, um, in, in one of the stories I tell in my book, Our, Our Net Has Holes in It, it is about, um, when we did our welfare reform initiative when I was commissioner in Virginia. Um, a year after its implementation, I wanted to, um, do some research and talk to some of the individuals that were impacted, so I asked my team to set [00:03:00] up, um, a statewide tour for me.
During that tour, I met, um, a woman named Barbara, okay? And, um, I, I, I said to her, "Barbara, I am-- I just wanna understand, you're a year into this now. How has this worked for you?" And I said, "Please don't feel like you have to sugarcoat it for me. I wanna know the good, bad, and different." And she said, um Mr.
Carter, wh- when my caseworker told me I was gonna have to go to work to get my welfare benefits, she said, "I, I was confused. I was distressed. I was frightened." She said, "I was... crawled up in a fetal position for weeks." She said, she said, "I had not worked in 14 years since the birth of my first child. I had no idea how I could do something like that.
And, and so [00:04:00] wh- when I got myself together, my first instinct was, you know what I'm gonna do? I'm gonna move to a- another county," because the way the initiative was set up is if the unemployment rate was at a particular level, we wouldn't implement the work requirement there. Mm. She said, "But I thought about that, and, and, you know, I was just...
See, I didn't do anything. So finally, the day came around when my caseworker said to me, 'Okay, Barbara, we, we gotta get you a job now.' So they helped me find a job at a convenience store." And, uh, and I said, "But, but, you know, how am I... What am I gonna do with my children, okay?" Uh, um, and my caseworker said, "Well, if we're gonna require you to work, we have to help you provide childcare so your children are cared for in a healthy, safe, and developmentally appropriate environment."
She said, "Oh, I didn't realize that." Um, and then she said, "Well, you know, I got a really old beat-up car, a- and it works some days and doesn't work other days." [00:05:00] And she said, "Well, we've got some help for that, too." She said, "So I went to work," and she said, "Do you know what I did with my first paycheck?" I said, "No, Barbara, I don't."
She said, "I took my children out for pizza." Mm. And she began to cry. Mm. And her caseworker began to cry. And I began to cry. A- and she said What I know now is I will never be on welfare again, because I didn't know that I could do this for myself and my children, but now I know. Mm. So I will never be on welfare again.
Mm. That is the kind of freedom-
Carli Patton: Mm ...
Clarence Carter: that we hope for all of our vulnerable neighbors. And so it's stories like that- Mm ... that help me mitigate against all the challenges and make getting up in the morning an inspiration. Mm.
Carli Patton: Where do you, where do you even pivot from there? Do you just wanna keep talking?
How [00:06:00] about you keep talking, and we'll keep listening to your stories, because I'm so grateful for your perspective to talk about this from a place of hope. Right. Because I think the narrative in the nation, whether you're looking at federally or at the state level or even community by community, is that it's a hopeless scene, that there's so much burnout.
How can we expect anyone to wanna do anything? Um, and then even good-meaning folks who wanna do something are afraid to enter. Right. And so I think what I'm most curious about, you have done this at the highest level. You've hit every single one of those levels in government. Mm-hmm. Can you talk a little bit about how your job has changed over time when you are dealing at the federal versus state level, and what's uniquely special about those different levels of working in these departments, but what is also uniquely challenging?
Clarence Carter: So, so what, what is uniquely different about the federal and state and local [00:07:00] levels of government in the administration of our safety net i- is that at the federal level, you- Make rules and move money.
Carli Patton: Mm-hmm.
Clarence Carter: You don't touch lives, okay? At the state and local level, where you actually administer the supports, you get the opportunity to touch lives, okay?
Mm. And there is... That's the fundamental difference, and it's why I like this level the best because you do get to see the tangible result of being able to touch lives and help folks move beyond that vulnerability. Mm-hmm. Um, and, and, and so having had the opportunity to see this challenge at the federal, state, and local levels of government, it, it has been my, my privilege to be able to do the...
most of this, the 35 years, at this level [00:08:00] where you really do get to impact the lives of people, and I can see stories like Barbara on all levels, um, as an, as an intimate part of the work that I do every single day. Mm-hmm.
Spencer Patton: Commissioner, throughout our nation, there is a deep skepticism about how dollars are stewarded, especially when it comes to government
Mm-hmm. And perhaps five times more or 10 times more when it comes to social safety nets.
Clarence Carter: Absolutely.
Spencer Patton: And you can point to events in Minnesota recently and things that capture the headlines that have, I imagine, produced significant headwinds for you in that undoubtedly, in every program that you touch, there is waste, fraud, and abuse.
Clarence Carter: That's correct.
Spencer Patton: And in every program that you touch, [00:09:00] there are lives that are literally saved as a result of what you do.
Clarence Carter: That's correct.
Spencer Patton: For someone that hears your role and hears what you do and meets it with scathing skepticism, how do you speak to someone that has that position? Where do you start?
Clarence Carter: So I, I, I, I start in, in answering that question with what our societal objective is and ought to be.
Mm-hmm. And what I mean by that is that- I believe that this nation is the most generous and benevolent nation known to humankind And this nation would give one the shirt off its back- Mm ... okay, um, where it understands vulnerability. And you see that [00:10:00] represented anytime there's any kind of tragedy or calamity, everybody runs to help, and they bring whatever they have, whether it's a shovel or a truck or a dollar bill or a sandwich or what have you.
It's in the DNA of this nation to help, okay? Mm. And, and so, and in this space, this human vulnerability space, that heart for serving the most vulnerable is manifested in the fact that we expend $1.4 trillion annually- Mm ... in
114 individual programs that were each, uh, designed to address some aspect of human need, okay?
Carli Patton: Mm-hmm.
Clarence Carter: So I start off with that s- skeptical individual by saying, "First of [00:11:00] all, it is in the DNA of this nation, pardon me, to give a damn. We care."
Carli Patton: Mm. Yeah.
Clarence Carter: Okay? So we care enough. It is not that we don't spend enough.
It is that the way we go about it is stupid. Okay? A- and so the design and operation of the government mechanism to manifest our heart for helping is ridiculous. Okay. And so because we care enough, left, right, and center, and we spend enough, then what we have to do is we have to go about redesigning how we do this.
And, a- and what I say to that person is, h- "Being someone who has lived inside the belly of the beast, I can tell you that there [00:12:00] is a way to do this more effectively, more efficiently, okay, in a way that manifests our heart to help and truly serves the most vulnerable amongst us."
Spencer Patton: Wow. Mm. That's incredible.
I mean, just to hear that really does capture the heart of our nation. It did. Like, left, right, and center- That's
Clarence Carter: right ...
Spencer Patton: there is a deep empathy-
Clarence Carter: That's right ...
Spencer Patton: that this nation is so distinct from other nations across the world. But the perception of left and right and all of the crosswinds that have been created culturally has made it to where we've got a lot of systems that just Are not working.
But like you said, there's 114 plan systems that no one designed that system at the [00:13:00] outset to say, you know, "Let's take advantage of the taxpayer," even though somebody might say that. Like, in, in- Right ... in earnest, like, that's not the case. Right. Like, there was at the beginning, someone had a heart to say, "Here's an issue, here's a solution."
But now we have 114 of them.
Clarence Carter: That's exactly correct. And, and I, I, I speak to that directly, um, in, in, in my book, and I use a metaphor, okay? Um, th- there is an attraction in San Jose, California, called the Winchester Mystery House. It is the home of Sarah Winchester, who was the heir to the Winchester rifle fortune, okay?
Um, S- Sarah was beset by, um, tragedy. Um, early in life, she lost her infant daughter to a horrible childhood disease, and not long after, she [00:14:00] lost her husband to tuberculosis. And so she went to a medium and asked, you know, "What is to become of me? What should I do with my life?" And the medium said, "You should go west and build, and the building that you do, it will atone for the lives that were taken by the Winchester rifle."
She moves from Connecticut to San Jose, California, purchases an eight-room farmhouse, and she hires a construction crew. And for the next 33 years th- of her life this construction crew, she would etch things on a napkin and give it to them and tell them, "Build that." At, at its apex, this eight-room farmhouse became a seven-story, 160-room edifice, [00:15:00] okay, that had more than 2,000 windows- Mm.
Okay? Um, 1,000 different doors, 16 bathrooms, okay? Uh, 13 kitchens, 40 stairways, okay? The problem is, is that because there was no intentional design, you had places in this house where stairways run right into ceilings, okay? Where beautiful stained glass is right up against brick, okay? Where you open doors to nothing.
Hallways run nowhere, okay? Um, and, and, and I use that metaphor, and I go on to say she spared no expense. She, she had a- a- all of the resources that she had, traveled all over the world, and got the, um, the best materials. But today, what stands is this monument to dysfunction.
Carli Patton: Mm.
Clarence Carter: Okay? [00:16:00] And I said, "I have lived a career in that same house."
"Except it is our American public safety net." And I said, "The difference," okay, "Sarah's was just a home which is now an attraction, but this American safety net, it is really about saving lives."
Carli Patton: Mm. "
Clarence Carter: And so it has much more consequence for its dysfunction."
Carli Patton: Well, and then you sit here and y- we believe you, right?
Like, that rings so true and it's a great visual, but you're sitting here and you're like, there are countless people living in this house- That's right ... with you.
Clarence Carter: Mm-hmm.
Carli Patton: Whether they be employees trying to fix it-
Clarence Carter: Right ...
Carli Patton: or the people that are receiving services. 'Cause part of you hears that and you're like, "I just wanna take a bulldozer, knock it down, and rebuild [00:17:00] the freaking house."
Right. But you also don't wanna harm any of the lives that live inside the structure. That's right. And so I guess when you're sitting on the outside, when you're thinking where you might get disheartened, if it's not the heart of the people, which is to give- Mm-hmm ... and the heart of America, and it's, you see the people that need it and you hear these stories, but you get disheartened 'cause it feels like you can't knock down the house and rebuild.
So what do you talk about in your book, or what is your hypothesis? Do we just start moving walls one by one? Do we try to make those staircases go to some place? What do we do?
Clarence Carter: Y- W- Uh, Carli, y- you do exactly that. You... We have to. W- We, we cannot close up shop, put out a sign and says, you know, "Under new management, we'll reopen soon." Sure. Okay? So we have to continue to serve. But it is my argument that if we begin with the end in mind, which is again, what [00:18:00] Sarah didn't do, there was no objective.
So if we begin with an end in mind, and that that end in mind is the freedom for those individuals in our society, our vulnerable neighbors who need help getting to the other side of whatever their life challenge is, so that they can live a life of their choosing. If we begin there with that as a true north and then say, "Okay, how do we re-architect the existing system to achieve that objective?"
Then what it, it enables us to do is to say these... And we'll just take the federal government here. These 114 programs, instead of them being destinations unto themselves, they become tools in a toolkit to achieve the broader objective of the freedom of our vulnerable [00:19:00] citizens. Mm. And so then that begs the question: how do you connect them so that they can serve the, those that need it in a more comprehensive way?
Part of the challenge of the existing design is because of the categorical independent nature of each of those supports, they weren't designed to work in conjunction. Mm-hmm. Mm. But the individual or family I serve doesn't only have a nutrition problem. They don't only have a housing problem. They don't only have a transportation problem.
They come as one individual or one family with connecting challenges. Yeah. And so the design of the system doesn't enable me to take a comprehensive approach to them. Right. But if I could re-architect the system so that I can say at the beginning, "What are the connected challenges to having you live a life of your choosing?"
Mm. [00:20:00] And then say, "Okay, let's reach into our toolkit and take out the tools that can help do that." Okay? Now, another important part of that is that Over the course of I think the past 80 years or so, as the size and scope of government has grown, it has worked to crowd out the other sectors of our society from being part of the problem-solving.
And so I mentioned to you 114 federal programs with $1.4 trillion. That doesn't speak to one penny of what
s- the state puts into it- Mm-hmm ... of what the private sector puts into our vision of helping. Mm-hmm. And so we don't have alignment from all of the different resources of our [00:21:00] society to be able to solve this problem. And I believe that if we were able to array, align, and leverage all of those assets, we have more than enough resources to solve the challenges of our vulnerable neighbors.
Carli Patton: Spence and I laugh a lot when we're raising our kids, is our goal is to work ourselves out of a job, and give them the tools and resources that when it's time for them to go, we love you-
Clarence Carter: That's right ...
Carli Patton: but it is not my job to do this anymore. No, that's right. And I think that's what you're saying with tremendous care, love, and concern, is your hope would be to work you and your counterparts across the country out of jobs, to make your jobs less and less as you reorient this structure to make it more and more efficient, and people not graduate, but find freedom- Right
from needing these safety nets. Is that what I'm hearing correctly?
Clarence Carter: It, it, it, it, it absolutely is with, with one add-on, okay? A- a- [00:22:00] and a number of my colleagues along the way have said, "Oh, you're trying to work us out of a job." And I said, "Let, let's not, let's not get out too far over our skis." There has never been A society where there have not been vulnerable individuals.
There will always be a need for this helping mechanism, okay? The challenge is, is it shouldn't be the same people that are always in that vulnerability. So what we need to do is have a mechanism that helps as many as possible move through the vulnerability so that we can serve others. So there will always be a need for the, the system of public supports, but that ought to be a, a, a system that focuses on [00:23:00] mobility, and then it enables us to focus on those that are truly in the most vulnerable state that could never, you know, get to that place where they could live a life beyond those supports.
So, so, so y-y-the, the, the- Well said ... the predicate is absolutely right, but there will always be a need for this system of supports. Mm.
Spencer Patton: So we're sitting here in Tennessee. Mm-hmm. And you've served in a lot of different capacities at the federal level, state level, under multiple governors. So what brings you, what did we do to deserve to have you here?
Because your wisdom and experience, having lived, as you said, in the belly of the beast for 35 years, like, I have immense trust in that if commissioner says it's true, it's true. Like, I believe you. So talk to us about Tennessee. [00:24:00] What brought you here?
Clarence Carter: S- so, um- I have to go back to just prior to Tennessee.
So my, my experience prior to Tennessee was administering, again, an agency at the federal level that administered one of the safety net programs, the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, okay? Now, that is the program that was developed out of the 1996 welfare reform initiative, when President Clinton said, "We are changing welfare as we know it."
Okay? This is when we moved from an open-ended entitlement to, uh, working for receipt of benefits and, and time-limiting, um, system. So it, it was the successor to, uh, a previous welfare program. Well, part of the unique way of the way this program works is [00:25:00] states are given a block grant annually, okay? And states can do, within a pretty wide range, whatever it is they choose to do to serve vulnerable families with dependent children, okay?
And
every state receives the same amount that they've received now for 30 years. In Tennessee's instance, it's $191 million every year to serve this population, okay? What is unique about this block grant is if the state doesn't expend it, it simply accrues at the federal level until the state does expend it, okay?
Well, when I got to my previous, um, responsibility in the federal government, I noticed that there was $6 billion unexpended across all the states. And so [00:26:00] I said to s-send out a letter to states and said, "Why don't we put these unexpended dollars to use in experimenting? Let's look at some new ways to serve vulnerable families."
Well, because the states don't like the federal government telling them what to do, they basically said, "Nah, leave us alone. It's our block grant." Well, um, as the Lord would have it, towards the end of that federal appointment Tennessee had the largest unexpended balance in the country. Okay. It was north of $740 million.
Carli Patton: Oh, wow.
Clarence Carter: Now, it wasn't as if we didn't have vulnerable families with dependent children, but we had $740 million that we hadn't expended.
Spencer Patton: C- and can you just give us 30 seconds about how that might happen? Like, like I, I get the accrual and that it doesn't get spent, but given that there's such a wide range, like I, I [00:27:00] haven't known governments to hesitate in spending money very often.
So why, why would that happen? Just real quick. I'm sorry to interrupt the story. No. N-
Clarence Carter: n- n- no. Why it would happen is because our thinking was very much in a very limited box for how it is that you can go about helping these vulnerable families. Okay. And so, you know, we put those dollars in play, um, in, in a very sort of narrow box, and also the caseload declined precipitously.
So th- there, there wasn't as many families to provide the cash assistance for, okay? Mm-hmm. And again, we were thinking in some very narrow boxes. So again, over the course of time, you had the accrual of a, a, of a little bit every year until it reaches $740 million. Hmm. Well, when that became public, [00:28:00] there was a massive hue and cry all across Tennessee.
Hmm. And so when I connected with Governor Lee, he said, um, "You're running the agency, the federal government that runs that program. Can you come to Tennessee and help us fix that problem?" Okay? Um, and I said, "Yes, sir, I can." And so, um, that's how I get to Tennessee, and then we worked diligently with the governor's office and the legislature to create the TANF Opportunity Act, okay?
And it was a very intentional piece of legislation that would help us do two things. One, have a
And a spend over the course of time that would put those dollars in place, um, in a [00:29:00] very effective way. Secondly, we designed several pilot initiatives, and we said to communities across the state, "If our objective is to do what we call grow capacity to reduce dependency for families with dependent children, what might like- what might that look like in your community?"
Mm. We got, um, abstracts from all over the state. Yeah. The advisory board chose 17 of those and said, um, "We, we like the framework here." We gave them a quarter of a million dollars, said, "Put some more meat on the bone." Okay? Mm. They did that. This advisory committee chose seven of those, and so those seven pilots have been operating for the past four and a half years now, okay?
And w- we will see the [00:30:00] results of that work, um, this December. Okay. Okay? Um, but we know anecdotally that those results are going to be tremendous and, and of actually leading to Tennessee being a model. Okay? Yeah. We are now, this year, in the 30th year of this program, the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, and Tennessee will show the way in what the next decade looks like in this because we did, in the words of, of, of another, a s- chief executive, "We didn't waste a good crisis."
We-
Carli Patton: Are you able... I know that the data's coming out in December- Mm-hmm ... and so it m- you may not wanna talk about specifically what some of those pilots are or where they are, but could you kind of, with a large brushstroke- Sure ... help us understand? 'Cause [00:31:00] I could imagine anything- Right ... would be your pilot, and you're getting so many bids.
So can you contextualize that a little bit- Sure ... so that we could understand what- S- ... practically that might be?
Clarence Carter: Sure. Let me, let me, let me f- focus on a couple of them.
Carli Patton: Yeah.
Clarence Carter: One is there, there is a term in the safety net system called the benefits cliff.
Carli Patton: Mm-hmm.
Clarence Carter: And what that reflects is because of the dysfunction of design of the system, and because there was no overarching intention to grow people beyond the vulnerability- If an, if an individual goes to work and receives a raise, okay, while they are still receiving benefits, let's just say they get a dollar an hour raise.
That dollar an hour raise could compromise [00:32:00] several hundred dollars in benefits that they are receiving. And so therefore, they actually have a disincentive to try to grow because they would... That little bit of forward movement would literally pull the rug out from under them in a place that they could not, uh, or that they, that they, that they could not, um, fill in that gap for a while.
Carli Patton: Yeah.
Clarence Carter: So we have a pilot that is designed to look at just that. How is it that you, you build supports so you create a slope from dependency to freedom?
Carli Patton: Mm-hmm.
Clarence Carter: Okay? That's one of the pilots. Um, and, and another one is, um, focused very intentionally on fatherhood. Okay? And, and I need to explain that, um, w- when I arrived here, [00:33:00] okay, um, one of the things that I said to my team is that Human services is our society's way of cleaning up societal mess.
Okay? After dysfunction has happened, we provide benefits, goods, and services to, uh, vulnerable populations. I said, "If we ever want to reduce the flow into us, we have to go upstream." Okay? And I said, "I wanna go upstream and I wanna focus on the family because the family is the most important unit in this or any other society."
And I wanna begin with fatherhood because our public policy construct i- in, in the safety net, it was designed for mother and child as if daddy didn't exist.
Carli Patton: Hmm. Hmm.
Clarence Carter: And literally, there was a time [00:34:00] not too long ago in our government construct where if there was a man in the house, that mother and child couldn't receive benefits.
Carli Patton: Wow.
Clarence Carter: Can you imagine the stupidity-
Carli Patton: Yeah ...
Clarence Carter: of our government that said, "Daddy can't be there"? Wow. So therefore... So I said, "Look, w- w- the first thing we wanna do in focusing on the family is we want to say in Tennessee that fathers are not a luxury. They're not a nice to have. They are an essential-
Carli Patton: Hmm ...
Clarence Carter: to the health and wellbeing of their children, of their families, of their communities, and the broader Tennessee."
So one of our pilots is focused on just that. How do you engage fathers that are disengaged to build their capacity to not only be the economic support, [00:35:00] but the full range of support that the father was intended to be? Okay? I- i- in, in the divine wisdom of the Creator, okay, mother and father bring very different- Essential sets of resources to children.
You can't create a, a child- Mm ... without mom and dad. Mm. It is essential for those very unique supports to help that child not only exist, but to grow and nurture. Mm. And so therefore, w- w- one of our initiatives is how do you, uh, how do we help families be intact so that that child can have the, the best developmental experience possible?
So it's those kinds of things- Mm ... that we are testing through these pilots- Mm ... to see [00:36:00] what works and, you know, what do we need to tweak if, again, our intention is to get to freedom.
Spencer Patton: Yeah.
Clarence Carter: That-
Carli Patton: I've never looked forward to reading a government report in my life, but I think I will look forward to reading this one in December.
Absolutely. Let's be clear. Absolutely. Yeah. Wow.
Spencer Patton: Wow. Now, Commissioner, I've served on the board for Focus on the Family- Mm-hmm ... for the last four years, and one of the most amazing things that Jim Daly, who runs Focus on the Family, talks about is that the most accurate indicator of a children's future- Right
is their family.
Clarence Carter: Absolutely.
Spencer Patton: It's was it a two-parent household?
Clarence Carter: That's right.
Spencer Patton: It is a better predictor of their future than where they're born- Mm ... the color of their skin- That's exact- ... education.
Clarence Carter: Exactly right.
Spencer Patton: It's incredible.
Clarence Carter: That's exactly right.
Spencer Patton: And so to hear that come out of your mouth in a place [00:37:00] where you're getting to make these decisions- Right.
Clarence Carter: That's right ...
Spencer Patton: is so inspiring to me. And I just, I can't help but sit here and just wonder how many people like you are in the system, because I know just sitting here, like, and I don't just say this to flatter you, but, like, you are really what feels like the exception rather than the norm. And so can you help, for those that are looking on and cheering you on and rooting you on, how do we support you and how do we support more people like you getting into a place of decision?
Clarence Carter: So, um, so first of all, okay People in positions like mine are political appointments, and what we are hired to do [00:38:00] principally is to maintain the existing system. Okay? Keep it... Keep the trains running on time, keep it functioning so that the dis-ease of the human condition doesn't thwart the other efforts that the, that, that chief executive set out to achieve.
Spencer Patton: Mm.
Clarence Carter: Mm. Okay? And so someone like me is very much a unicorn.
Spencer Patton: Yeah.
Clarence Carter: Okay? A- a- and the way that I have had to carve out space to be able to not only keep the trains running on time, but to look out over the horizon- Mm ... is to put a team around me that is very much a team [00:39:00] that understands how to make the trains run on time.
Mm. And that that's what they are dedicated to, okay? What I s- what I said to my team very early on, "If we don't make the trains run on time, I don't have either the grace or the space to look out over the horizon."
Carli Patton: Yeah. Okay?
Clarence Carter: So, so, so the, the, the first challenge is
that th- there are two different kinds of managers. There are architect managers and maintenance managers.
Carli Patton: Mm-hmm.
Clarence Carter: Most human services leadership is asked to be maintenance. Yeah. Okay? And I, I, I simply have been very intentional about carving out space to be an architect. Mm. Now, the way that You guys are being very helpful is with an opportunity like this.
Mm. Because [00:40:00] once your audience understands that, oh, maybe this thing isn't hopeless.
Carli Patton: Mm. Yeah.
Clarence Carter: Okay, maybe there is something I can do to help. Maybe there is a vision beyond what I think is the, the impossible, then that will allow us to engage. Okay? I, I believe that once the broader community understands that, oh my goodness, I understand why it's a mess and that there's a way for it not to be, I believe that that will push in on the rest of the system to demand the kinds of changes that we're talking about here this morning.
Mm.
Carli Patton: I do have a question. As a everyday citizen, there's a lot of conversation, especially in your space, between what is the government's to do, what is small business and community involvement to do, what is the church's job- Mm-hmm ... and as a small business owner and a member of a [00:41:00] flourishing church, and someone that cares a lot about this, can we speak a little bit about how people could get involved if they're maybe not government employees- Sure
and they're not social workers or caseworkers? How can we get involved as business leaders, as church members, as community people to serve the vulnerable?
Clarence Carter: So, so, so Carli, let me, um, begin by sh- sharing a story. Okay? Mm. So, um, well, it's now been almost three years ago, um, Governor Lee hired a director of his Office of Faith and Community, a gentleman named Lance Viljoen.
Okay? And, um, I met with Lance and I said, "Lance What it's my objective to do is to transform the Tennessee safety net. And I said, "My agency operates in [00:42:00] transaction. We, we provide benefits, goods, and services for our vulnerable neighbors." And I said, "But our vision for transformation is to grow as many vulnerable Tennesseans beyond that vulnerability as possible."
And I said, "If that's our objective Transaction has to be paired with relationship. And I said, "Quite frankly, government can do transaction, but it sucks in the relationship business." Mm-hmm.
Carli Patton: Yeah.
Clarence Carter: I said, "But the community of faith transacts in relationship." Mm-hmm. And I said, "So, um, c- could I ask you, could you convene some Tennessee faith leaders?
Because what I wanna do is I wanna ask them for help in this." And he brought together clergy from the [00:43:00] mountains of Appalachia to right to the Memphis border. Mm-hmm. Okay? And, um, I started off by saying it was President Reagan that said the nine most dangerous words in the English lexicon is, "I'm from the government, and I'm here to help."
Okay? I said, "Today, I'd like to turn that saying on its head." I said, "I'm from the government, and I am here asking for your help, asking for your help because we want to engage in an endeavor which makes Tennessee the model in this nation for growing our vulnerable neighbors beyond that vulnerability.
And so we wanna partner transaction with relationship to do that." And those faith leaders said We absolutely want [00:44:00] to help, but we got two caveats. One, you have to explain to us exactly what help looks like, okay? And two, you've gotta get some of the mess of dealing with government out of our way so we can help.
And that is the journey that, uh, Lance and I together have been engaged in, um, over these past, uh, over these past three years. And the, the, the... We, we are just beginning to see the results of that in, um, something I'll talk about in a couple of minutes, this Human Flourishing Initiative. But the headline here is that if we are intentional, if government is intentional about convening and asking the rest of the community, getting over its own arrogance to believe that it's the [00:45:00] principal problem solver, and it says, "Hey, rest of the community, can you come and help us with this?"
We can make this that very kind of tragedy and calamity that we talked about earlier, that everybody comes to help. And the truth is, what we s- showcase through our relationship with the community of faith is that while this is, if you look at it from the outside, a massive problem, but if we take this in bite-sized pieces- Mm
and everybody does a little bit, if, if every individual in every community of faith in Tennessee just did a little bit, you know, may- maybe just was able to care for a foster child, okay? Or, or, or, or be a mentor, okay? Or, or on and on and on. Everybody can do a [00:46:00] little bit of something. And if, again, if government would get out of its own way and say humbly to the rest of the society, "Please help," there is more than enough.
This problem is not bigger than all of us.
Spencer Patton: Commissioner Carter, when you're thinking more philosophically about how the system should function, tapping into that architect vision that you have, what is your vision for how the system ought work?
Clarence Carter: So, so After we have that shared vision of the ultimate freedom of the consumer that we serve, then we have to begin with an operating architecture that starts with that consumer, okay?
Mm-hmm. We have to understand from that consumer that we are serving, that [00:47:00] individual, that family, that whatever, what is the array of challenges that have them in the vulnerable state that we find them in? Mm-hmm. You see, the way the system currently works is, it's what I call program-centric. I get required at my level to administer a program.
I don't get required to foster human wellbeing.
Spencer Patton: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Clarence Carter: And so it's my argument that if I can begin with an understanding of what are your connected and p- and presenting challenges, then I can go to the toolkit, and I can help you construct a, uh, um, a, a, a plan beyond that vulnerability, and then, quite frankly, walk beside you- Mm-hmm
and help make that happen. Mm-hmm. S- so my argument is [00:48:00] that, one, we need to make this a consumer-centric system where we begin with the end for that consumer in mind, as opposed to a program-centric system. And then the other part of this is we have to measure what counts. Right now, and let me just take a, um, a, uh, one, one program.
The, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program- Mm-hmm ... or SNAP, which everybody knows, still knows as food stamps, okay? The, the, the objective of that program is to ensure that folks that are economically vulnerable can put healthy and nutritious food on the table, okay? Now, as the administrator of that program and my agency that operates it, we get measured on three outputs Did we get that benefit to the consumer that was [00:49:00] entitled to receive it?
Did we get it to them in the right amount? And did we get it to them in the appropriate timeframe? Mm. If I do those three things well, I done run a great SNAP program.
Spencer Patton: Wow. Mm.
Clarence Carter: Now, ain't nobody asked me, okay- Mm ... did I do anything to help somebody not need SNAP- Mm-hmm ... tomorrow or next month or next year.
Mm-hmm. Okay? So we are focused on operating outputs of programs, not human wellbeing. Mm. And so I do not want to throw out the baby with the bathwater here. I wanna keep those operating metrics, but I wanna pair them with wellbeing and impact. Are we helping that vulnerable neighbor grow beyond the vulnerability that has them in a state where they have to go to their government to ask for the most basic of subsistence?
Our objective ought to be to help them grow beyond that, and the measurement of our success is the [00:50:00] degree to which we achieve that objective.
Spencer Patton: Mm-hmm. Mm. I think that's so brilliant, because that really translates to me with a business mind, that if I set up my employees of an operation and incentivize them in delivering boxes, that it wasn't about getting it on time, it wasn't about getting it to the right door, but it was just about is the box broken or not, right?
That's right. Like, that's just a, that... Maybe I just choose that out of the air. It's like- That's right ... is the box smushed or is it not smushed? That's it. And then fundamentally, I'm really not doing anything that I should be doing, which is getting the box to your door- That's it ... and keeping it out of the rain, and doing all these things.
It's like, is it smushed or not? That's it. And that really helps put the lights on for me. Mm. And I can totally see that in especially a government structure, to where you have a lot of maintenance-oriented people that [00:51:00] truly have the heart of serving what they're being asked to do. That's right. Like, they're trying to serve the state and serve the government, and they're saying, "Hey, I'm, I'm h- I'm shooting at the targets that I'm given."
Clarence Carter: And we have a system that takes that heart for service and makes them clerks.
Spencer Patton: Yeah.
Clarence Carter: Okay? Mm. Um, and, and, and so you literally sap some of the very helping energy-
Spencer Patton: Mm-hmm ...
Clarence Carter: um, out of individuals whose heart it is to serve.
Spencer Patton: Mm.
Carli Patton: Mm.
Spencer Patton: That's what I needed right there. That was amazing. Commissioner Carter, we land every podcast with a couple fill-in-the-blank sentences.
Mm-hmm. So there'll be a short phrase and a blank at the end, and you can either fill it in with a word or a short phrase- Okay ... that you think completes the thought. If you'll just repeat the prompt back to me and then give me the word at the end here. Sure. Okay? All right. A safety net is successful when [00:52:00] blank.
Clarence Carter: A safety net is successful when a, a consumer that needs that safety net grows beyond it and gets to the place where they can say, "Thanks, but no thanks, because I can take the baton of my life and run the rest of the race."
Spencer Patton: Hmm. That's phenomenal. The biggest misconception about public assistance is blank.
Clarence Carter: The, the biggest misconception about public assistance is that the vast majority of those served don't choose to be on that system. Hmm. They simply don't know how not to be. Hmm. And it becomes our objective as a society to help them figure out how not to be.
Spencer Patton: Hmm. Hmm.
Carli Patton: Hmm.
Spencer Patton: And the last one, the thing [00:53:00] 35 years in public service has taught me is
Clarence Carter: what? The, the, the thing that 35 years in public service has taught me is we do a massive disservice to not only our vulnerable neighbors, but the rest of our community by the way that we operate the system that is meant to help the most vulnerable.
Carli Patton: Mm-hmm.
Clarence Carter: It is designed and operated improperly, but there's a way to do that better.
Spencer Patton: Commissioner Carter, thank you for being on this episode with us. Right from the outset, your heart posture, the wisdom that you speak with, and the intentionality can only come from a place of the authenticity [00:54:00] that you carry with you.
Serving 35 years in, I would say, one of the very hardest places in government to serve, yet sitting here more than three decades afterwards, having served two presidents and four governors and a mayor with success all throughout, and you bring a spirit of what you have today, which is hope and a plan and a vision, is just really, really special.
I learned a ton today, and it also helps heal a part of my spirit that can look at these programs and be really judgmental, can be really negative, and feel like we just wanna burn it all down. And you've given me a [00:55:00] really helpful insight into the people at every level, the ones doing the service and receiving the services, and I just really thank you for that today.
And I'm excited to give your vision a little bit more of a megaphone because you're the leader that we need in running this program. So thank you.
Clarence Carter: A- a- and, um, I, I thank both of you, Spencer and Carli, for the opportunity to do so. Th- this is the kind of megaphone that this vision needs. The, the, the broader community needs to understand that there is hope for this to be a better manifestation of their heart to help the vulnerable in our society.
So thanks so much f- for the opportunity.[00:56:00]
Spencer Patton: Commissioner Clarence Carter, he runs Tennessee's Human Services for the governor. An incredible conversation.
Carli Patton: Mm.
Spencer Patton: Someone that speaks with an authenticity of having lived 35 years in public service and actually has a plan, a believable plan, not a partisan plan, but a true vision for how the safety nets that are part of the hallmark of our society, of, of the heart of our society, what makes us different from so other nations, can actually work.
I
Carli Patton: think Health and Human Services is often the last on the totem pole. It feels bleak. It feels like there's so much going on there. It's confusing for a lot of people. It feels like it's not changing or innovative, and so it kind of gets pushed down the bottom of the totem pole after [00:57:00] education, let's say, or different economic development, or things that people think are sexier than Health and Human Services.
But I would argue that if you get this piece of the pie correct, it serves every other piece of the government. It serves our communities. It... There is literally nothing more impactful than serving families, helping them progress through whatever hard time they're in so that they have a brighter future for themselves and their children.
It has economic benefit. It changes the education system. It changes the kids that are in the education system. It changes how we are able to use resources in the state, how we're able to have jobs in the state. I mean, this man touches all of that, and because he has that gift of being a bit of a visionary, which a lot of his counterparts don't have the privilege of even getting to think outside of their day-to-day check the box, somehow he's carved that out and given me a fresh perspective of just [00:58:00] how tremendously important this is.
Spencer Patton: Yeah. Hearing Commissioner Carter talk about the importance of fathers in a household was so incredibly brave. That's a political statement to make, even though it-
Carli Patton: Which is insane to me, but it is. It is a political move to say that
Spencer Patton: Doesn't feel like it should be, but his boldness to say fathers, mothers, the family unit, is one of the most important indicators of a child's future The study that is gonna be released in December of 2026 revealing how we reengage fathers that are not engaged currently is gonna be must-read material.
Carli Patton: Well, along with his book, I [00:59:00] mean, I've been on the record as saying I'm much better at reading fiction than nonfiction. Let's just, like, I love a good story, but I'm sitting here wondering why his book is not in every civics class in the state, because I just think there's so much misconception about what Health and Human Services is and what can be done to bridge the gap.
Spencer Patton: Yeah.
Carli Patton: And also, this is an aside, but I just, my heart was touched. I've spent this year reading excerpts of different C.S. Lewis books, and I'm in this part of the book called The Screwtape Letters. And if somebody hasn't read it, pick it up. It's a little spicy. People won't know what Screwtape Letters is and what they're getting into, but I've read it several times.
And there's this part where the enemy, right, the enemy of humans is trying to mastermind how to get at somebody to make it so that their life is just a little bit less positive, a [01:00:00] little bit worse, and so ultimately they don't flourish, as the commissioner talks about. And he talks about building up the pomp and circumstance of checking the box and, quote, unquote, "doing the right thing" from the heart posture of who you're doing it for and who your community is.
And it happens every day in a family where we can say, "Oh, we're doing the right thing. We're serving our neighbor," while we want to cuss them out when we're behind our car door or behind a keyboard. And, you know, Screwtape does it in this really interesting, almost poetic way. But I couldn't help but think about that classic novel as he was talking, that it's, it's indicative of the human soul.
It's so much easier to check a box than it is to care about the holistic picture of another human being. And it takes humility to say, "My motives aren't always right. I want out of here. This is hard for me." Um, and I think he has mastered himself in those really hard spaces and is [01:01:00] now a beacon of light trying to lead the way.
