California Legislature Hears Package of Anti-Poverty Bills

Democratic State Senator Holly Mitchell has authored a bill that would repeal the 20-year-old rule capping a mother’s state welfare grant even when she has another child. Mitchell says recent budget policies have given California a dubious distinction.

 “We believe it has had a direct impact on the increase in child poverty in the state of California, bringing child poverty to the highest point in the U.S.,” she says.

Other bills would lift the lifetime public assistance eligibility ban for people convicted of non-violent drug offenses and remove the welfare-to work requirement for people caring for the child of a family member.

Anti-poverty advocates estimate that more than 15 billion dollars has been cut from state social safety net programs since the beginning of the Great Recession in 2008.