The 2026-27 Budget: County Administration and H.R. 1 Implementation [Publication Details]

Mar 5, 2026 - In this brief, we assess the Governor's proposed funding for county administration of Medi-Cal and CalFresh in response to H.R. 1 and provide related recommendations.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Detail/5149

The 2026-27 Budget: County Administration and H.R. 1 Implementation

Mar 5, 2026 - Minimizing Error Rates and Related Fiscal Penalties. Given the significant fiscal impacts involved, avoiding penalties for error rates is a high priority for the state, particularly in CalFresh. Potential penalties in Medi ‑Cal are less certain and immediate but taking steps to limit payment errors in Medi ‑Cal is also warranted.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/5149

The 2026-27 Budget: Food Assistance Programs

Feb 18, 2026 - Counties also make administrative errors when determining eligibility and calculating benefits. California ’s most recent payment error rate, for federal fiscal year 2023-24, is about 11  percent. (The comparable national error rate is similarly about 11  percent.)
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/5126

The 2021-22 Spending Plan: Human Services

Nov 22, 2021 - When these overpayments are discovered, they are typically repaid by reducing the family ’s future benefits by 10  percent a month (or 5  percent, if the error was made by county administrators rather than the family itself).
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4476/2

The 2021-22 Budget: Assessment of CalHEERS Dashboard

Mar 25, 2021 - More specifically, the Legislature tasked our office with assessing ( 1)  w hether the dashboard comprehensively captures issues known to stakeholders and the administration that cause delays or errors in eligibility processing, ( 2)  h ow the dashboard is being used as part of a process to set a time line for fixing the identified issues, and ( 3)  o pportunities for legislative oversight.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4408

Estimating the CalWORKs Take-Up Rate

Feb 2, 2021 - In talking with program experts, our best guess is that the errors introduced by these assumptions roughly cancel each other out, such that a more detailed estimate (one which corrected for all of these simplifying assumptions) would be roughly equal our estimates.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4340

Comparing CalWORKs Take-Up Rates Across Demographic Groups

Feb 14, 2023 - Consequently, we advise caution in the interpretation of our estimates —in particular, the smaller the population estimated, the more likely our estimates are subject to error. That said, our estimates do provide insight —particularly when comparing across groups —into CalWORKs participation.
https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4678