BILL ANALYSIS Ó ----------------------------------------------------------------- |SENATE RULES COMMITTEE | SB 79| |Office of Senate Floor Analyses | | |(916) 651-1520 Fax: (916) | | |327-4478 | | ----------------------------------------------------------------- UNFINISHED BUSINESS Bill No: SB 79 Author: Committee on Budget and Fiscal Review Amended: 6/17/15 Vote: 21 SENATE FLOOR: Not relevant ASSMBLY FLOOR: Not available SUBJECT: Human services SOURCE: Author DIGEST: This bill is the omnibus human services trailer bill. This bill provides for statutory changes necessary to enact human services-related provisions of the Budget Act of 2015. Assembly Amendments delete the Senate version of the bill and insert the current language. ANALYSIS: This bill makes the following statutory changes to implement the 2015-16 Budget Act: Federal immigration assistance. Effective January 1, 2016, and subject to annual funding in the Budget Act, the Department of Social Services (DSS) must contract with qualified nonprofit legal services organizations to provide application assistance to persons residing in California who are eligible for, or to renew, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) or Deferred Action for Parents of Americans and Lawful Permanent Residents (DAPA) status. Specifically, the language: 1) Requires DSS to provide grants to qualified non-profit SB 79 Page 2 organizations who meet the definition of the Internal Revenue Service 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(5). 2) Specifies the types of services that a nonprofit organization may provide, including: a) Services to assist with the application process for initial or renewal of deferred action under the DACA policy or the DAPA policy; b) Services to provide legal training and technical assistance to eligible non-profits; c) Services to help obtain other immigration remedies for people receiving DACA or DAPA application assistance; and d) Services to assistance with naturalization or appeals that arise from the process. 3) Defines the services that can be provided that assist the application process to include: outreach, workshop presentations, document review, Freedom of Information Act requests, and screening services to assist individuals with DACA, DAPA, naturalization, or other immigration remedies. 4) Defines "legal training and assistance" to include webinars, in-person trainings, and technical assistance in the form of answering questions via email, fax, or phone. 5) Requires that grants awarded must fulfill specified criteria, including: a) For nonprofits under 501(c)(3) or 501(c)(5) status, have at least three years of experience handling immigration cases; have conducted trainings on immigration beyond staff persons; and are accredited by the Board of Immigration Appeals under the U.S. Department of Justice's Executive Office for Immigration Review, or be a Trust Fund Program administered by the State Bar of California. b) For a legal services organization that provides legal training and technical assistance, have at least ten years SB 79 Page 3 of experience conducting immigration legal services and receive funding by the Trust Fund Program administered by the State Bar of California. 6) Requires grant recipients maintain adequate legal malpractice insurance. 7) Requires DSS to report to the fiscal legislative committees the following information: a) Implementation timeline; b) Participating entities awarded contracts and grants; c) Number of applications submitted; d) Types of services provided and in what language; e) Ethnic communities served; and f) Identification of further barriers and challenges to immigration assistance and legal services related to naturalization and deferred action. 8) Limits the amount of grant funds available to be advanced to a qualified nonprofit to 40 percent. 9) Requires DSS, subject to available Budget Act funding, provide grants to organizations that provide free education and outreach information, services, and materials. 10)Defines the terms "education" and "outreach" to include referrals to educational or legal services that support an applicant's eligibility for citizenship or deferred action, and the importance of participating in civic engagement as a naturalized citizen. Education and outreach activities are prohibited from including representation as legal counsel that assists in the application process. CalWORKs. This bill includes provisions pertaining to the CalWORKs program, including: SB 79 Page 4 11)Housing Support Program (HSP). SB 855 (Budget and Fiscal Review, Chapter 29, Statutes of 2014) established the CalWORKs HSP and provides $20 million ($12 million General Fund) ongoing to specified counties to provide evidence-based interventions to families receiving CalWORKs who are at risk for homelessness, or are homeless. Services could include landlord outreach, housing search and placement, legal services, and housing barrier assessment. Trailer bill language: a) Requires DSS to award funds, according to criteria developed by the department in consultation with the County Welfare Directors Association, to provide CalWORKs housing support to recipients who are experiencing homelessness or housing instability. b) Authorizes counties to continue providing housing support under the CalWORKs HSP to a recipient who may no longer be income eligible for CalWORKs. c) Makes other technical, non-substantive changes. 1) Child support pass-through for long-term sanction cases. Federal law prohibits the Department of Child Support Services from passing collected child support through to the state on behalf of non-Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) families and requires payments be made directly to the family. In contrast, state law requires families to assign support rights and requires counties to refer families on CalWORKs to the Local Child Support Agencies. This bill resolves the federal and state law conflicts, and exempts long-term sanction cases from assigning their child and spousal support rights to the state/county. Funding for these cases is switched to non-maintenance of effort General Fund, so these cases will no longer assign their child support to the state. 2) Mid-year reporting requirement. Previous law requires a CalWORKs recipient to report a drug felony conviction, as specified, within 10 days. SB 855 (Budget and Fiscal Review, Chapter 29, Statutes of 2014) made eligible adults who were previously ineligible for benefits due to a prior felony drug SB 79 Page 5 conviction, effective April 1, 2015. AB 106 deletes an outdated mid-period reporting requirement that is no longer applicable. Community Care Licensing (CCL). This bill amends the CCL division within DSS' existing inspection frequency, by certain facility type. Specifically, language increases the inspection frequency from the current level of at least once every five years, to once every three years for child care facilities; once every two years for children's residential facilities; and annual inspections for adult and senior care facilities. The table compares existing law to the proposed inspection requirements, by facility type and over time. ----------------------------------------------------------------- | | | | |Facility Type |Existin | | | |g Law | | | | | | ----------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------ | | | | | | | | |Stage |Stage 2: |Stage 3: | | | |1: | | | | | | |January 2018 |January 2019 | | | |January | | | | | |2017 | | | ------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------------ | | Inspections must occur at least once every. . . | ------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------------ | Child care | 5 | 3 years | 3 years | 3 years | | facilities | years | | (unchanged | (unchanged | | | | | from stage | from stage | | | | | 1) | 1) | ------------------------------------------------------------------ | Children's | 5 | 3 years | 2 years | 2 years | | residential | years | | | (unchanged | | care | | | | from stage | | facilities | | | |2) | SB 79 Page 6 |----------------+--------+---------+--------------+---------------| | Adult and | 5 | 3 years | 2 years | 1 | | senior care | years | | |year | | facilities | | | | | ------------------------------------------------------------------ The CCL division will continue to conduct random inspections on at least 30 percent of all facilities annually, as is current practice. Child Welfare Services. This bill contains the following provisions pertaining to child welfare services, including: 3) Approved Relative Caregiver (ARC) program. SB 855 (Budget and Fiscal Review, Chapter 29, Statutes of 2014) established the ARC Option Program and provided an ongoing annual appropriation of $30 million General Fund, to be adjusted annually by California Necessities Index (CNI). Under the ARC program, relative caregivers receive an applicable regional per-child CalWORKs grant, plus the General Fund portion in an amount that provides a rate equal to the basic foster family home rate (based on the age of the child). Participating counties are provided General Fund, based on the a county's number of eligible ARC placements in the county as of July 1, 2014. If the county-specific ARC caseload exceeds the baseline caseload of July 1, 2014, the county must be responsible for making the full ARC payments and responsible for the county-share of the CalWORKs payment. The langauge streamlines the application process for grant payments, maximizes federal funding, and ensures that families do not experience a break in services or payment. Specifically, the language specifies: a) Foster children and non-minor dependents (NMDs), who are eligible to receive an ARC payment will be placed into a separate assistance unit. b) The CalWORKs portion of the payment will be the exempt maximum aid payment for an assistance unit of one. c) If the relative caregiver is needy, his or her SB 79 Page 7 assistance unit size will include the number of ARC children, or NMDs, only for pruposes of determining program income and eligiblity of the CalWORKs assistance unit. For purposes of calculating the grant amount for the needy caregiver, the ARC child and NMD is excluded. d) Foster care resource limits will be used to determine eligiblity of an ARC child and NMD. e) Overpayments will be collected pursuant to existing foster care program requirements. f) County of court jurisdiction has payment responsibliy for ARC children and NMDs. g) An approved relative caregiver is exempt from Statewide Fingerprint Imaging Systems, reporting, immunization, and other CalWORKs requirements. h) The General Fund appropriation must be increased annually by an amount greater than the CNI to ensure that the caregiver payments get a full CNI adjustment. i) The General Fund portion of the ARC payment may be countable towards maintenance-of-effort (MOE), only if the General Fund is not counted as MOE for another purpose. j) DSS must presume that counties have opted-out of the program if funding for the base period is reduced under specified conditions, unless a county notifies DSS in writing of its intent to opt-in within 60 days of the enactment of the state budget. aa) In a circumstance whereby a county decides to no longer participate in the ARC program, the county must provide at least 90 days notice to the approved relative caregiver(s) that the per child per month payment will be reduced, and the date the reduction will occur. 1) Intensive Treatment Foster Care (ITFC) rate extension. ITFC offers an alternative, family-like setting for foster children who would otherwise be placed in group homes Rate SB 79 Page 8 Classification Level (RCL) 9 through 11. SB 1013 (Budget and Fiscal Review Committee, Chapter 35, Statutes of 2012) authorized the Continuum of Care Reform (CCR) effort to develop recommendations related to the state's current rate setting system, and to services and programs that serve children and families in the continuum of Aid to Families with Dependent Children-Foster Care (AFDC-FC) eligible placement settings. In addition, SB 1013 provided for an interim increase in rates, including a CNI increase, intended to ensure providers keep pace with the costs of providing care, recruitment, and retaining qualified foster caregivers for children needing intensive treatment in a home-based setting. Trailer bill language that includes the following provisions: a) Extends, from June 30, 2015 to December 31, 2016, the applicable interim period for specified modified service and rate levels, which support modified in-home support counselor hours per month, apply. b) Extends, from June 30, 2015 to December 31, 2016, the interim period for which specified modified serve and rate levels, that support the modified standard rate schedule, apply. c) Requires the rate for the modified standard rate be adjusted for the CNI on July 1, 2015, and on July 1, 2016. Adult protective services. The department shall, to the extent funding for this purpose remains with the department, establish one full-time position which reports to the director to assist counties with the following functions in their operation of the adult protective services system 1991 Realignment. AB 85 (Committee on Budget, Chapter 24, Statutes of 2013) modified 1991 Realignment Local Revenue Fund (LRF) distributions to capture and redirect county savings resulting from the implementation of federal health care reform effective January 1, 2014. AB 85 established the Family Support Subaccount within the LRF beginning in 2013-14. The Family Support Subaccount receives sales tax revenues redirected from the Health Subaccount, which then redistributes the funds to SB 79 Page 9 counties for the CalWORKs program. While this redirection mechanism frees up General Fund resources to pay for Medi-Cal costs, according to the Administration, the process to achieve this is significantly burdensome for the State Controller's Office and the Department of Finance. The language eliminates the need to redirect sales and use tax and vehicle license fee revenues between the Health and Social Services Subaccounts and makes other necessary technical and clarifying changes related to AB 85. Other issues. This bill also includes additional provisions: 16)Data sharing agreements. Authorizes the Employment Development Department to share data with federal, state, or local government departments or agencies, or their contracted agencies, to support social services administration. 17)Suspension of the fingerprint licensing fee exemption. Existing law prohibits the DSS and the Department of Justice from charging a fee to process a criminal history check of individuals who are licensed to operate child and adult facilities, to provide care in a facility, or who reside at that facility. This language authorizes allows DSS to charge fees for this criminal history check and extends this suspension for two additional years. 18)Suspension of the incentives under the Department of Child Support Services (DCSS). The language suspends health insurance incentives and improved performance incentives. a) Existing law requires the DCSS to provide a health insurance incentive ($50 per case) to the local child support agency (LCSA) for obtaining third-party health coverage, or insurance, for beneficiaries, if the budget provides General Fund support for the incentive. Since 2003, these health insurance incentive payments to LCSAs have been suspended. This language suspends the health insurance incentive and the top 10 improved performance incentive for two years. b) Existing law requires DCSS to provide to 10 counties, which demonstrate the best performance on federal and SB 79 Page 10 state performance standards, an additional five percent of the state's share of those counties collections used to reduce or repay aid. Since 2002, these top 10 performance incentive payments to LCSAs have been suspended. This language suspends the top 10 improved performance incentive for two years. 19)Establishes new successor fund for the California Senior Legislature (CSL). The California Fund for Senior Citizens first appeared on the 1983 personal income tax return. Donations to the California Fund for Senior Citizens supports the ongoing work of the CSL. In 2014, the California Fund of Senior Citizens received $229,522 in voluntary contributions. Because it did not meet the minimum contribution amount of $250,000, it fell off the tax check-off for the 2014 tax return. Trailer bill language that establishes the CSL Fund as the successor fund of the California Fund for Senior Citizens. 20)This bill appropriates $30 million for the Approved Relative Caregiver Funding Option program to the Department of Social Services. FISCAL EFFECT: Appropriation: Yes Fiscal Com.:YesLocal: Yes SUPPORT: (Verified6/19/15) None received OPPOSITION: (Verified6/19/15) None received Prepared by: Samantha Lui / B. & F.R. / (916) 651-4103 6/19/15 9:28:36 SB 79 Page 11 **** END ****