Bill > SB560

This bill modifies California's public social services regulations, focusing on welfare fraud and overpayment procedures. It significantly reduces criminal penalties for benefit overpayments and establishes new protections for recipients. Specifically, the bill eliminates criminal prosecution for most benefit overpayments, prohibits additional criminal charges for statements made to welfare departments, and requires county human services agencies to carefully review cases before taking action. The bill mandates that counties cannot pursue criminal action for overpayments if they received data match information (like New Hire Registry or Income and Eligibility Verification System data) and did not provide timely notice to the recipient. For CalFresh and CalWORKs programs, the bill limits overpayment recovery to 24 months prior to discovery, requires a qualified caseworker to review case files before reducing grants, and prevents criminal prosecution if an overpayment was not intentional or if the recipient is in repayment status. These changes aim to reduce punitive measures against social services recipients and provide more procedural protections, while still maintaining mechanisms for administrative recovery of mistaken or unauthorized benefit payments.

Budget and Finance, Health and Social Services, Justice

https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billStatusClient.xhtml?bill_id=202520260SB560