For legislators desperately looking for painless ways to help financial strapped counties, here's an easy one: Assembly Bill 2368. The bill by Assemblyman Felipe Fuentes, D- Sylmar, would bar the state from denying welfare benefits to poor people who own cars.
Under current law, low-income Californians who own a car valued at $4,640 or more are barred from receiving benefits under CalWORKs, the state's biggest welfare program. The $4,640 car value limit is the most restrictive in the country and has not been adjusted for a decade. Only two other states, Texas and Idaho, are as stingy. Twelve states exclude all cars owned by a household. Another 15 exclude at least one vehicle per household.
Given the inadequacy of the state's public transit systems, cars are not a luxury in California. For many California workers, particularly minimum-wage workers who often work late shifts after transit has stopped running, a reliable car can be a necessity to keep a job. A study of the transportation needs of welfare-to-work participants in Los Angeles County found that 64 percent who had unlimited access to cars were gainfully employed while only 44 percent who relied on public transit or sharing rides with friends were working.
The need for transportation assistance to the poor is likely to become even more acute in Sacramento. The county is wrestling with its own sizable budget deficit. To save money, supervisors are slated to eliminate its innovative wheels-to-work program in which used surplus county vehicles are provided to welfare recipients who have jobs but no access to transit and need cars either to get to work or to get their child to child care.
Besides making it easier for the poor to find and keep jobs, the Fuentes bill would eliminate the administrative burden counties face trying to determine which applicant for welfare has a car and what the car is worth, a time-consuming and costly task. Workers have to find out the make and model of each applicant's car, as well as its mileage and then "guesstimate" the worth.
Experience shows that cars worth less than $4,650 are older models with a lot of mileage and not very reliable. Very few welfare applicants are denied benefits because they have cars over the limit. Still, the calculation has to be done. It cost more for counties to make the determination than it would cost them to grant the benefit.
The state Welfare Directors Association estimates California counties would save $3 million in administrative costs if they could eliminate the car test. In other states where rules have been changed to eliminate car asset tests, the change has not resulted in any spike in the number of those found eligible for benefits.
The Fuentes bill has made it through the Assembly on mostly party-line votes, with Democrats voting for it and Republicans against. Locally, Sacramento Assemblyman Roger Niello voted "no" as did Lodi Assemblyman Alan Nakanishi. The Fuentes bill saves money for counties and helps the poorest of the poor in our state get to work. To vote "no" is not just mean-sprited. It wastes money that cash-strapped counties can't afford.
