BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 492
Page 1
GOVERNOR'S VETO
AB
492 (Gonzalez and Gomez)
As Enrolled September 8, 2016
2/3 vote
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|ASSEMBLY: |64-9 |(January 28, |SENATE: |37-0 |(August 18, |
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|ASSEMBLY: |65-15 |(August 30, | | | |
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Original Committee Reference: HUM. S.
SUMMARY: Provides, as of October 1, 2020, a $50 diaper benefit
issued through an electronic benefits transfer (EBT) system for
each child two years of age and younger in a California Work
Opportunity and Responsibility to Kids (CalWORKs) assistance
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unit that is enrolled in child care as a supportive service, as
specified.
The Senate amendments:
1)Delay commencement of the benefit, and the requirement that it
be issued through an EBT system, until October 1, 2020, and
remove the requirement that the Department of Social Services
facilitate the orderly administration of state government to
make the benefit available at the earliest possible time.
2)Remove the requirement that the benefit be delivered through
the specified, existing EBT system and, instead, require that
the benefit be delivered through an EBT system in general.
3)Specify that the diaper benefit may only be used to purchase
diapers.
4)Rename the benefit from the "diaper needs benefit" to the
"diaper benefit."
FISCAL EFFECT: According to the Senate Appropriations Committee
on August 11, 2016, this bill may result in the following costs:
1)Beginning fiscal year 2020-21, ongoing costs to Department of
Social Services (DSS) in the range of $14 million to $18
million per year for a $50 voucher for children in CalWORKs
under age 3. Currently, approximately 26,000 children in
CalWORKS are under age 3 and would be eligible for benefits
under this bill. It is unknown whether the caseload that
would be impacted by this bill would increase or decrease
significantly in 2020 and following years. (Federal Temporary
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Assistance for Needy Families (TANF)/General Fund)
2)Minor one-time state costs for updating an EBT system to
deliver the diaper benefit.
3)Additional, potentially reimbursable, county costs for
administering the diaper benefit.
COMMENTS:
CalWORKs: The CalWORKs program provides monthly income
assistance and employment-related services aimed at moving
children out of poverty and helping families meet basic needs.
Federal funding for CalWORKs comes from the TANF block grant.
The average 2016-17 monthly cash grant for a family of three on
CalWORKs (one parent and two children) is $497.35, and the
maximum monthly grant amount for a family of three, if the
family has no other income and lives in a high-cost county, is
$704. According to recent data from the California DSS, around
497,000 families rely on CalWORKs, including over one million
children. Nearly 60% of cases include children under six years
old.
Maximum grant amounts in high-cost counties of $704 per month
for a family of three, with no other income, means $23.46 per
day, per family, or $7.82 per family member, per day to meet
basic needs, including rent, clothing, utility bills, food, and
anything else a family needs to ensure children can be cared for
at home and safely remain with their families. This grant
amount puts the annual household income at $8,448 per year, or
42% of poverty. Federal Poverty Guidelines for 2015 show that
100% of poverty for a family of three is $20,090 per year.
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Welfare-to-Work requirements: Welfare-to-work activities within
the CalWORKs program include public or private sector subsidized
or unsubsidized employment; on-the-job training; community
service; secondary school, adult basic education and vocational
education and training when the education is needed for the
recipient to become employed; specific mental health, substance
abuse, or domestic violence services if they are necessary to
obtain or retain employment; and a number of other activities
necessary to assist a recipient in obtaining unsubsidized
employment.
Unless they are exempt, single parent adults must participate
for at least 30 hours per week in welfare-to-work activities,
whereas the minimum participation requirement for two-parent
families is 35 hours per week. After receiving aid for up to a
maximum of 24 months, adults without an exemption must work in
unsubsidized employment or participate in community services
activities for the minimum number of hours listed above. If a
CalWORKs recipient who is not exempt from participation does not
meet his or her welfare-to-work requirements, the recipient is
sanctioned for noncompliance, and that recipient's portion of
the family's grant subtracted from the amount provided to the
family to meet basic needs.
Child care as a supportive service: Under current law, the
support services available to CalWORKs participants include
child care, transportation costs, ancillary expenses, and
personal counseling, all of which require specified information
to be reported to the county in order to verify necessity. In
order to receive child care, for example, a CalWORKs participant
must verify employment, child care costs, and hours and dates of
employment, educational, or training activities. Title 22 of
the California Code of Regulations provides standards to which
licensed child care centers must adhere, including that a center
shall ensure each infant has sufficient changes of clothing and
diapers, and that each infant's clothing and diapers are to be
changed as often as necessary to ensure that each infant is kept
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clean and dry at all times.
Whereas ancillary expenses include the cost of books for school,
tools, clothing specifically required for a job, fees and other
necessary costs related to employment or education, there are no
such ancillary payments provided for the children who live in
CalWORKs families. As children sometimes rapidly grow out of
clothes, there is no supplement provided to their parents for
increased clothing costs, and for infants and toddlers, there is
currently no supplement to pay for diapers. While child care is
provided within the CalWORKs program to facilitate a parent's
participation in employment or another required welfare-to-work
activity, not having enough money to purchase diapers can result
in the loss of access to child care, which impedes a parent's
ability to go to work or participate in a welfare-to-work
activity, resulting in a sanction for non-compliance with the
program requirements.
Need for this bill: With this bill, the author seeks to ensure
that babies and toddlers in poor families receiving CalWORKs
have the diapers they need, which benefits the children who can
continue to be enrolled in child care, as well as the parents
who can continue to go to work as a result of that child care.
The author introduced a similar measure, AB 1516 (Gonzalez) of
2014. That bill also attempted to provide access to diapers,
but did so through an $80 per month young child special needs
supplement, which would have been provided to families as part
of the CalWORKs cash grant for each child under two years of
age. While this bill includes children under three years of
age, the scope is narrower, as it provides a $50 per month
diaper-needs benefit through the EBT card and specifically ties
the benefit to child care enrollment pursuant to a parent's
welfare-to-work plan.
According to the author, "Despite being critical to the health
and hygiene of young children, diapers are excluded from state
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and federal assistance for low income families. There is no
mechanism for relief from the high cost of diapers in
California, even for those families we already support through
programs such as CalWORKs. An inadequate supply of diapers can
jeopardize a parent's employment by limiting their access to
child care. Additionally, diaper need can cause avoidable and
costly health consequences for the child and become an equally
unhealthy stressor on parents. The goals of this legislation
are to remove a potential barrier between parents and child
care, and to alleviate the financial and health risks associated
with diaper need."
The author goes on to note that child care utilization, which
helps to facilitate more consistent employment for parents on
CalWORKs, can help increase success of the program and
potentially result in savings in other safety-net programs.
GOVERNOR'S VETO MESSAGE:
I am returning the following five bills without my signature:
Assembly Bill 492
Assembly Bill 885
Assembly Bill 1584
Assembly Bill 1770
Assembly Bill 1838
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Each of these bills make changes to a worthy program that
results in increased funding, a few of which received increases
in this year's budget. These bills are an end run of the budget
process, and would commit us to spending an additional $240
million every year.
The budget process allows for all spending proposals to be
weighed equally through public hearings, negotiations and,
finally, approval of a balanced budget. This is the best way to
evaluate and prioritize all new spending proposals, including
those that increase the cost of existing programs. This process
is even more important when the state's budget is precariously
balanced.
The budget process begins again on January 10, 2017, which is
the appropriate time to discuss these proposals.
Analysis Prepared by:
Daphne Hunt / HUM. S. / (916) 319-2089 FN:
0005100