“Twenty-five other states, including Massachusetts, Illinois and Connecticut, have also introduced hair discrimination bills, according to the Crown Coalition, which includes the civil rights groups Color of Change, the National Urban League and the Western Center on Law & Poverty, as well as the beauty brand Dove.”
Today the Supreme Court chose to allow the Trump administration to enforce its cruel and inhumane Public Charge immigration rule, even though the underlying case has not yet been decided. The decision upsets historical legal precedent in which courts preserve the status quo while litigation is pending.
As we stated in our initial statement on the rule, and in our comments to the Department of Homeland Security, this ruling will have long term detrimental effects on the health of our nation. This rule change is a cruel action aimed at immigrant communities with the unrealistic intent to create a whiter, wealthier version of the United States that does not, has not, and will never exist. The administration’s continued attacks on our country’s already inefficient and unfair immigration system weakens our nation of immigrants.
We will explore all options to protect the wellbeing and safety of our clients and communities.
For more information:
Learn more about public charge at keepyourbenefitsCA.org (English) and tusbeneficiospublicos.org (Spanish). You can also text “benefits” (for English), “libre” (for Spanish), “福利” (for Chinese) or “lợiích” (for Vietnamese) to 650-376-8006.
Visit the Protecting Immigrant Families Campaign website for fact sheets, community flyers, and more public charge details: https://protectingimmigrantfamilies.org/community-education-resources/
Contact the Health Consumer Alliance if you are worried about how your access to health care may impact your family’s immigration status: https://healthconsumer.org/
Find a trustworthy immigration attorney for individual counseling at the organizations on this list: https://www.cdss.ca.gov/Benefits-Services/More-Services/Immigration-Services/Immigration-Services-Contractors
For a PDF of this analysis, click here.
Last week, Governor Newsom unveiled his $222 billion 2020-21 budget proposal. Western Center’s summary of the proposal can be found here.
The state is in its 11th year of increasing tax revenue, and estimates a $5.6 billion budget surplus over existing obligations. The budget continues the practice of prioritizing saving state revenue for future years by increasing the Rainy Day fund to $18 billion and paying down state debts to reduce state payments in future years.
Governor Newsom is focused on addressing many long standing issues, particularly the homelessness and housing crisis. The budget proposes to allocate $1.4 billion to a variety of solutions, including $750 million in one-time funding to shore up board and care facilities, provide rental assistance to those at risk of or experiencing homelessness, and to fund adaptive re-use of existing structures to create additional housing that people experiencing homelessness can afford. The budget also includes substantial new funding for health care, including a proposal for the state to manufacture prescription medications and to expand health care to undocumented seniors.
The budget proposal does not include the third step of CalWORKs funding that would bring grants to 55 percent of the federal poverty level. Instead, the budget proposes a 3.1 percent increase for CalWORKs grants in October 2020. The budget also provides no increase in state funding for Supplemental Security Income (SSI/SSP) grants, keeping in place recession era cuts that have still not been restored.
Homelessness
The Governor’s budget proposes $750 million in one-time funds to be deposited in the new California Access to Housing and Services Fund, which the Governor recently created by executive order. The fund would be administered by the Department of Social Services, which would allocate dollars to “regional administrators” to be used to provide short- and long-term rental subsidies to people at risk of or experiencing homelessness, create additional housing units affordable to people with extremely low-incomes, and stabilize licensed board and care facilities around the state. How funds would be allocated and administered remains open to negotiation.
Housing
The budget proposes a one-time $500 million increase in the state Low-Income Housing Tax Credit program, which funds the production and rehabilitation of housing affordable primarily to households with incomes between 30% and 80% of area median income (AMI).
Financial Security
CalWORKs: CalWORKs has gone through a period of substantial investment. In 2019, the budget included funding for a 13 percent grant increase, expanded the earned income disregard to $500 a month, and stabilized CalWORKs child care for families. This budget is not as ambitious as prior years, though it does provide a 3.1 percent increase in grants beginning October 2020. This will increase grants for a family of three by about $25 a month. However, it was anticipated that CalWORKs grants would be raised to 55 percent of the federal poverty level to ensure no child lives in deep poverty. This budget proposal will not achieve that goal.
The budget does include funding to increase the CalWORKs child support pass through. Under current law, the first $50 of child support paid by the non-custodial parent goes to the CalWORKs family, but any amount over that is used to pay for the cost of welfare benefits to the state and federal government. Beginning January 2022, CalWORKs families with one child will keep the first $100 of child support, and families with two or more children will keep the first $200 of child support.
We are grateful the Governor heard parents and families in their call for a child support program that works for children. The increases to child support pass through and relief from government-owed, uncollectable debt proposed by the Governor look like a good start. We are eager to see the associated proposed trailer bill law changes so we have more details, and look forward to working with the Governor and legislature to achieve the goals of conforming with federal law and regulation, and ensuring the program works to benefit the children it purports to help.
Fines and Fees: The budget proposes to expand the traffic court ability to pay pilot program statewide. Currently, an eight county pilot program (operational in four counties) allows persons to adjudicate traffic tickets through an online portal and reduce fines by at least 50 percent for low income drivers. The budget would expand this pilot statewide over several years to all counties. The pilot has yet to be evaluated.
Additionally, the budget makes a $92 million investment in reducing criminal justice fees and their harmful, recidivistic impact on people with low-incomes and people of color, their families, and their communities. We are grateful to Budget Chair Mitchell for her leadership on this issue and look forward to working on details with her, the Governor, and other budget leaders.
SSI/SSP: The SSI/SSP caseload continues to decline, and as a result, state funding for the state supplemental program (SSP) is declining. In the 2020-21 budget the administration projects a 1.6 percent decline in SSP spending to $2.66 billion, down from $2.73 billion in the 2019-20 budget. This continues a trend of declining state spending for disabled and elderly adults. As recently as the 2016-17 budget, the state spent $2.87 billion. Rather than invest savings from caseload declines into grants, the savings are going into the General Fund for other purposes. SSI/SSP grants are critical for paying the cost of housing; this failure to invest in SSI grants will put more recipients at risk of homelessness.
Health care
Expands full-scope Medi-Cal to all income-eligible undocumented adults age 65+ (Health4AllSeniors): Building on the 2019 Budget, which made California the first in the nation to expand full-scope Medi-Cal to adults up to age 26 regardless of immigration status, the Governor’s recent proposal includes $80.5 million ($64.2 million General Fund) to expand full-scope Medi-Cal to all income-eligible undocumented adults age 65 and older. This would benefit about 27,000 older adults, to be implemented no sooner than January 1, 2021. Full implementation costs are projected to be approximately $350 million ($320 million General Fund) in 2022-23 and ongoing.
Delays 2019 Budget Act suspensions from December 31, 2021 to July 1, 2023: The 2019 Budget made important Medi-Cal investments that were to be suspended on December 31, 2021 and the proposal delays these suspensions by 18 months. This includes restoration of Medi-Cal benefits (optical, audiology, podiatry, speech therapy, and incontinence creams and washes), extension of Medi-Cal eligibility from 60 days to one year for post-partum women diagnosed with a mental health disorder, expansion of Medi-Cal screening for the overuse of opioids and illicit drugs, and Prop 56 supplemental payments to providers.
Funding for CalAIM (recently renamed to Medi-Cal Healthier California for All Initiative): The Governor’s proposal includes $695 million ($348 million General Fund) for CalAIM effective January 1, 2021 and ongoing. Despite the name change, the administration continues to advance policy changes released in October’s proposal. The proposal still terminates the Health Homes Program (HHP) despite loss of enhanced federal match rate and the Whole Person Care (WPC) program, and includes $225 million to implement the new statewide enhanced care management benefit through plans. Plans will have the option of providing housing transition services, currently provided under HHP and WPC, and other services In Lieu of Service. The Dental Transformation Initiative will end December 2020, but $112.5 million is proposed to continue and expand program elements including provider incentives for preventive services (expanded to adults); provider incentive payments for continuity of care (expanded to adults); caries risk assessment, and adding silver diamine fluoride as a covered service for children.
Termination of Dental Managed Care in Medi-Cal: The administration proposes transitioning Medi-Cal dental services from a managed care delivery system, currently mandatory in Sacramento and optional in Los Angeles, to a fee-for-service (FFS) system in January 2021. A net zero fiscal impact is estimated due to small administrative savings offset by higher dental utilization in FFS system. However, any transition will have to ensure existing consumer protections for enrollees in dental managed care, including network adequacy requirements, continuity of care protections, and a strong grievance and appeal process.
Medi-Cal Medication Assisted Treatment Benefit Changes: The administration proposes adding all FDA approved drugs (specifically buprenorphine and buprenorphine-naloxone combination) to treat opioid addiction as a Medi-Cal benefit. Currently, only methadone and naltrexone is covered for Medi-Cal enrollees needing Medication Assisted Treatment; adding two new drugs is estimated to cost $876,000.
Prescription Drug Cost Containment: The Governor proposes to continue last year’s Executive Order to carve-out the Medi-Cal managed care benefit from managed care to fee-for-service effective January 1, 2021 to include savings that are partially offset by creation of a new supplemental payment pool for non-hospital clinics for 340B pharmacy services. The Governor also proposes to establish the state’s own generic drug label to manufacture certain generic drugs, establish a single market for drug pricing within the state to combine purchasing power, and expand authority to negotiate with manufacturers internationally for Medi-Cal supplemental rebates.
Potential Public Option: With more details to come, the Health and Human Services Agency will develop options to strengthen enrollment, affordability, and choice through Covered California, including leveraging the network of existing public Medi-Cal managed care plans.
Office of Health Care Affordability: The administration proposes the establishment of the Office of Health Care Affordability in spring 2020 to increase price and quality transparency, and to reduce costs to generate savings to directly-impacted consumers.
Hearing Aids for Children: The budget proposes to create a state program to assist families with the cost of hearing aids and related services for children without health insurance coverage for households with incomes up to 600% FPL.
Behavioral Health: The administration proposes to establish the Behavioral Health Task Force Agency and strengthen enforcement of behavioral health parity laws. The Department of Managed Health Care’s enforcement will focus on timely access to treatment, network adequacy, benefit design and plan policies. The administration also supports updating the Mental Health Services Act to focus on people with mental illness experiencing homelessness, those involved in the criminal justice system, and for early youth intervention.
“Even with all this evidence that fees are recidivistic and fees are bad for children and bad for communities of color … we still end up with counties choosing to continue to collect them, and that’s really disappointing,” said Jess Bartholow, legislative advocate at the Western Center on Law & Poverty, which sponsored the original legislation. “Why would we allow these fees to continue to be out there and create harm?”
First and foremost, Western Center is pleased that Governor Newsom’s proposed budget includes significant and innovative proposals to address the homelessness crisis in California, which will not only help the thousands of people currently experiencing homelessness, but will also prevent more people from losing their housing. We are also pleased to see the Governor take another major step toward providing health care for all by expanding Medi-Cal coverage to undocumented adults over age 65, and to see the extension of the tax ban on period products and diapers, which makes our tax code more equitable for women, girls and young families.
We were hoping to see additional investments for CalWORKs and SSI grants in this proposal, since they are both crucial for lifting Californians out of poverty. We will continue to advocate for those increases in the final budget agreement.
Below are our initial reactions to the proposed budget by issue area. We will release an in-depth analysis next week.
Housing
The proposed budget appropriately treats the state’s homelessness crisis as an emergency. The proposal devotes additional resources to help people at risk of homelessness remain stably housed and to increase both temporary shelter capacity and permanent housing options for people already experiencing homelessness. We are pleased to see the Governor’s sustained commitment to addressing homelessness and look forward to working in partnership with his administration and legislative leaders to further develop effective, sustainable solutions to the crisis that prioritize residents living in poverty.
We agree with the Governor that the state must ramp up efforts to address the state’s shortage of housing, which is primarily a shortage at lower income levels. We are eager to work with the Governor to ensure that policies and programs to speed housing production prioritize the creation of units for households with the lowest incomes who are priced out of the rental market in every county in the state, protect low-income communities and communities of color from displacement, and increase access to high opportunity areas for our clients.
Financial Security
The budget includes funding to increase the CalWORKs child support pass through (read about it here). Currently, the first $50 of child support paid by a non-custodial parent goes to the CalWORKs family, but any amount over that is kept by state and federal governments. In the Governor’s newly proposed budget, CalWORKs families with one child will keep the first $100 of child support, and families with two or more children will keep the first $200 of child support, beginning January 2022. It also includes funding to provide debt relief for child support owed to the government that is deemed uncollectable. We are grateful that the Governor has heard from parents and families in their call for a child support program that works for children, and we are eager to see proposed associated trailer bill law changes for details. We look forward to working with the Governor and legislature to achieve the goals of conforming with federal law and regulation, and ensuring the program works to benefit the children it purports to help.
The budget also includes the extension of the tax ban on period products and diapers, which will make our tax code more equitable, since taxes on period products and diapers are regressive to poor families and young people. We look forward to continuing work in the legislature to end unmet diaper need and period poverty in California.
Additionally, the budget makes a $92 million investment in reducing criminal justice fees and their harmful, recidivistic impact on people with low-incomes and people of color, their families, and their communities. We are grateful to Budget Chair Mitchell for her leadership on this issue and look forward to working on details with her, the Governor, and other budget leaders. We’re also happy to see that Californians with low incomes will soon be able to reduce the cost of their traffic fines and the overall impact of expensive traffic tickets, with this budget proposing to expand the traffic court ability-to-pay pilot program (currently operational in four counties) statewide over several years. The pilot has yet to be evaluated, so we look forward to details from the Judicial Council to see if the program’s reductions in fines and fees are adequate or need to reduced further.
Finally, to further enhance financial security for Californians, the Governor’s budget creates a new state version of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). The proposed financial watchdog will hold banks and other financial firms accountable when they engage in unfair and abusive debt collection and banking practices. Medical, student loan, school lunch, and other forms of debt disproportionally burden people experiencing poverty; we expect this new agency to offer important protections for our clients.
Health Care
We applaud the Governor for continuing to move toward universal coverage by making California the first in the nation to expand full-scope Medi-Cal to all income-eligible seniors regardless of immigration status, taking a whole person approach to Medi-Cal, and cost containment with an eye toward quality and equity. We look forward to working with the administration and legislature to advance a budget that ensures equitable access to affordable, comprehensive, quality health care for poor Californians.
The Governor’s proposal also delays suspension of benefits and eligibility, by extending certain Medi-Cal benefits (optical, audiology, podiatry, speech therapy, and incontinence creams and washes), extending Medi-Cal eligibility from 60 days to one year for post-partum women diagnosed with a mental health disorder, and expanding Medi-Cal screening for the overuse of opioids and illicit drugs, all until July 2023.
“Black women have long experienced microaggressions and faced discrimination for wearing our natural hair, which makes the passage of California’s CROWN Act so monumental. Dove, the National Urban League, Color of Change, and Western Center on Law and Poverty, joined forces to create the CROWN coalition.”
JOINT PRESS RELEASE
SACRAMENTO, CA: The Sacramento City Unified School District (District) and plaintiffs suing the District for alleged discrimination against students based on race and disability asked the federal court to pause litigation so the parties may seek potential resolution through settlement.
The lawsuit, alleged as a class-action, was filed by a coalition of nonprofit advocacy groups on behalf of the Black Parallel School Board (BPSB) and three students in the District. The suit alleges that the District’s policies and practices in the areas of special education and student discipline harm students with disabilities, and in particular, Black students with disabilities.
While the District does not agree with the allegations in the lawsuit, “we appreciate plaintiffs’ willingness to work with us,” said District Superintendent Jorge A. Aguilar. “The District believes that we should work cooperatively with the plaintiffs to identify potential policies and practices that may not serve the best interests of the District’s students with disabilities, and to jointly find solutions to those issues, which would include addressing factors which limit service options or strategies for serving District students,” said Superintendent Aguilar.
The parties have asked the Court to grant a seven-month stay of the litigation. During the stay, and by early February, the District has offered and agreed to implement several measures intended to benefit students with disabilities, including Black students with disabilities. These measures include: Halting all District suspensions based on “willful defiance” not only for students in kindergarten through third grade, but up and through eighth grade; Offering students a special education assessment plan within 15 days of a request for such assessment; and Directing school administrators and staff not to ask or require students to leave school as an informal response to concerns with student behavior.
“These measures are significant to students with disabilities and their parents and guardians whom we and other advocates in our community fight for and support,” said BPSB Chairperson Darryl White. “The District’s willingness to implement these interim measures has encouraged BPSB to engage in cooperative discussions with the District about potential broader and more permanent reforms and protections for our students.”
Also, during the stay, an agreed-upon set of experts will review the District’s data and practices in the areas of special education, student discipline, and implicit bias. That review will include expert interviews of students, parents, District staff, and other stakeholders. After the assessment and study of the information gathered, the experts will issue recommendations that the parties will consider as part of a possible settlement to create positive, lasting change for students and their families.
The Court granted the requested stay of litigation today, December 20, 2019.
Media Contact:
Courtney McKinney, Director of Communications, cmckinney[at]wclp.org
Co-Counsel:
Disability Rights California
Equal Justice Society
National Center for Youth Law
When Dove commissioned a study for its new initiative, the CROWN (Creating a Respectful and Open Workplace for Natural Hair) Coalition—in partnership with the National Urban League, Color Of Change, and Western Center on Law & Poverty—the results were revealing: black women are consistently rated as less ready for job performance when they wear their hair in its natural state. Revelations from the study have already helped advance the mission of workplace equality, like the CROWN Act, a California and New York law ensuring protection in those states against discrimination in the workplace based on hairstyle.
Across America, girls with ethnic hair types are being unfairly policed for the way they wear their hair – even being dismissed from school and sent home because it’s “distracting.” Shonda Rhimes and Dove are leading the charge to brings real girls, administrators, and policymakers together in the fight against hair discrimination.
Earlier this month, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 36, written by Senate Majority Leader Bob Hertzberg (D-Van Nuys), which regulates the use of pretrial risk assessment tools.
…“Money bail is unjust and unconstitutional and California’s justice system is failing us by allowing it to continue,” said Jessica Bartholow, of the Western Center on Law and Poverty. “We are proud to support efforts to end money bail, but know that replacing it with a process that uses algorithms to determine whether a person is eligible for pretrial release leaves the system vulnerable to racism, classism and ableism. SB 36 is an important next step to de-incarcerating people prior to their determination of guilt and to making sure [we] do this without bias impacting the outcome. We are grateful for its signature.”
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