New CalFresh rules requiring many to work to receive food benefits go into effect Monday

On Monday, new rules kick in that require many who apply for government food assistance to be working. It's a mandate from President Trump's HR-1 budget bill, and those who supply food to struggling people are wondering how it's all going to work.  

The changes could leave potentially hundreds of thousands of Californians looking for work.

SNAP is the federal food assistance program once known as food stamps. In California, the program is called CalFresh, and people get their benefits loaded onto an EBT debit card, which can be used to purchase food at grocery stores.  

When those benefits are cut or disrupted, the burden for keeping people fed falls on places like the Alameda County Food Bank.  The food bank's director, Michael Altfest, said that's exactly what they're preparing for now.

"Over the course of this coming year, we're expecting somewhere between 20-to-30,000 people having their benefits either eliminated or impacted as a result of this cut," he said.  "But because of the nuances of the exemptions and all those sorts of things, it's going to be a while before food banks really know what the impact is going to feel like."

The HR-1 spending bill requires that, to get food assistance, people ages 18–64 without dependent children under age 14 must participate in qualifying work, volunteer or training activities for at least 20 hours per week. 

There are some exemptions for students, pregnant women and those with physical or mental disabilities. 

"It definitely will mean that people who are within those definitions will need to meet those work requirements somehow," Altfest said.

He said everyone is trying to figure out how to quickly expand work or volunteer opportunities for thousands of new job seekers.

That's what Michael Bernick, Special Counsel at Duane Morris LLP, did when he headed up the state's Employment Development Department.  

Bernick thinks the new work requirements could be beneficial, as they were in the 1980's when the old welfare system was overhauled. He said that to be effective, it requires an entire support system to help people with job training and placement.

"It's a tough, tough, tough world out there in terms of trying to get a job. But that's why you need this work structure and support," Bernick said.  "These work mandates can actually be successful or positive, as they were in the welfare-to-work, but they need to have these other elements that we don't have right now."

Bernick said he believes having people do productive work is beneficial financially and psychologically. But at this point, no one knows what will happen when thousands of new people get dumped into an already tightening job market.

"The main point you bring up is the right one, which is, where are these jobs coming from?" he said. "That's been the big gap so far.  So that even those of us who support the rules are concerned that you need this other structure placement, or transitional jobs, or some supported work."

There is still a little time to figure it out. The rules give non-working applicants three months of benefits before they are cut off.  

CalFresh clients must reapply for benefits every year, so they will have 90 days after they reach their reapplication date to find work. For that reason, it could take 12 to 15 months to know what the full impact of the new rules will be on both the job market and the food safety net.