The 2024-25 Budget: Food Assistance Programs

Feb 16, 2024 - CalSAWS was introduced in 2019 and, as of October 2023, all 58 counties use the system. The federal government helps manage an Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) system which deposits monthly benefits for CalFresh and other human services pr ograms onto cards to be used at grocery and convenience store checkout counters.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4845

The 2025-26 Budget: Food Assistance Programs

Feb 19, 2025 - The shift from a mix of state and federal funds in 2024-25 to all General Fund in 2025-26 is largely due to the end of a federal policy allowing states to temporarily replace stolen SNAP benefits using federal funds from October 1, 2022 to December 31, 2024 (California has therefore returned to replacing any stolen benefits with state funds, as was its practice before October 2022).
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4971

The 2020-21 Spending Plan: Human Services

Oct 23, 2020 - The Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP) provides about $50  million annually in federal funding to 49 California food banks (serving all 58 counties) to purchase and distribute food to low-income families.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4286/2

The 2026-27 Budget: Supplemental Security Income/State Supplementary Payment (SSI/SSP) Program

Mar 3, 2026 - SSP Grants Were Increased in 2016-17, 2021-22, 2022-23, and 2023-24.  Since the Great Recession, as seen in Figure  2, grants for individuals and couples have been increased four times —in 2016-17 (by 2.76  percent), 2021-22 (by 23.95  percent), 2022-23 (by 10.3  percent), and 2023-24 (by 9.2  percent).
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/5148

Trends in CalWORKs: Participant Characteristics

Jun 16, 2025 - Therefore, gender identity is only known for about 10   percent of CalWORKs heads of household. However, since women made up an overwhelming share of individuals who did supply their gender identity in their CalWORKs application (based on 2022 data), this pattern may extend to the full CalWORKs population, but the extent to which is  unknown.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/5057

The 2026-27 Budget: Child Welfare

Mar 3, 2026 - Center for Excellence $750,000 ongoing beginning in 2022 ‑23. Emergency Response Augmentation $50 million one ‑time in 2021 ‑22 and again in 2022 ‑23, expendable for four years (through June 30, 2026 for the later allocation).
https://lao.ca.gov/publications/report/5147

The 2024-25 Budget: Child Support

Feb 27, 2024 - Given we estimated the Governor ’s budget solved a $58  billion budget problem —and revenues continue to deteriorate —the administration likely will not implement the full passthrough to current CalWORKs families as part of the May Revision.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4861

The 2026-27 Budget: CalWORKs

Feb 18, 2026 - Overestimates led to a large amount of unspent TANF —$767  million —estimated to be available to reduce state spending in CalWORKs in 2022-23. Similarly, $664  million in unspent TANF funds was estimated to be available in 2024-25.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/5122

The 2022-23 Budget: Analysis of Child Welfare Proposals and Program Implementation Updates

Feb 22, 2022 - The Governor ’s 2022 ‑23 budget proposal includes an additional $92.5  million augmentation as agreed to as part of the 2021 ‑22 package. DSS issued guidance to counties about the availability of the 2021 ‑22 non ‑competitive allocations for all 58 counties (and a tribal set aside) in mid ‑February; county welfare departments will indicate whether they accept their allocations by the end of March.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4558

The 2017-18 Budget: Analysis of the Human Services Budget

Feb 28, 2017 - The actual delivery of many services takes place at the local level and is typically carried out by 58 separate county welfare departments. A major exception is the Supplemental Security Income/State Supplementary Payment (SSI/SSP), which is administered mainly by the U.S.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/3576