Judge Bars Welfare Cuts for Counties

SACRAMENTO — Less than eight hours after a new welfare policy went into effect, a federal judge issued a temporary restraining order Tuesday barring counties from enforcing the regulation that required them to pay lower benefits to families who move to California from other states.

U.S. District Judge Lawrence K. Karlton of Sacramento said his order would remain in force until May 16, when a hearing can be held on a request to permanently ban the policy.

The ruling decision came after lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union and the National Organization for Women Legal Defense and Education Fund filed a class action lawsuit contending that it was unconstitutional for the state to discriminate against new residents to discourage them from migrating to California.

“You can’t put up fences around states to keep out poor people,” said Mark Rosenbaum, legal director of the ACLU of Southern California.

The legal challenge is being closely watched by other states that have followed California’s lead in seeking to limit welfare benefits to new residents.

The judge’s ruling was a defeat for Gov. Pete Wilson who has long championed the welfare change, which is expected to save about $13.5 million a year by paying reduced benefits to newcomers.

Five years ago, Wilson persuaded the state Legislature to pass a law that would limit new residents who apply for aid to the benefit levels paid by the states where they formerly lived.

He contended that the law was needed to save California from becoming a welfare mecca because it offered higher benefits to families with children than most other states. But efforts to put the law into effect were blocked by the courts until Congress passed a new welfare act last summer that gave states broad license to design their own assistance programs.

“This is an issue of fundamental fairness,” Wilson said Tuesday. “Hard-working families don’t get a pay raise when they move to California and neither should welfare recipients.”

“Our state has a very generous welfare grant compared to most of the rest of the country. California needs to focus its limited resources on our state’s own longtime residents, not those who may be moving here to take advantage of our generosity.”

Saying he believed the courts would ultimately rule in his favor, Wilson accused “narrow special interests” of attempting to circumvent the wishes of the people and their representatives.

California is one of four states that have approved policies that treat newcomers who apply for welfare differently than established residents, but the ACLU lawsuit is the first to challenge the state’s implementation under the new federal welfare reform act.

The final decision in the case is expected to have national implications as other states attempt to enforce similar policies. At least six other states are moving to adopt similar restrictions this year while 30 other states have told the National Governors’ Conference they have no plans to provide different benefits to newcomers.

Corinne Chee, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Social Services, which oversees California’s welfare programs, said agency officials were not surprised by the ruling and would “vigorously” fight any attempt to make the order permanent.

“This was passed by the Legislature by a two-thirds majority,” Chee said.

She said the state also would attempt to enlist the federal government to assist with defending the case even though the ACLU had not named the federal government as a defendant.

In Los Angeles, a spokeswoman for the County Department of Public Social Services said the office would rescind instructions to implement the policy that were issued to welfare offices Tuesday morning.

“Certainly if there is now a temporary restraining order, people will be made whole if any of them were affected by the earlier instructions,” said spokeswoman Carol Matsui.

ACLU attorneys filed the lawsuit on behalf of a woman, referred to by the pseudonym Brenda Roe, who moved to Long Beach with her husband after he was laid off from a steel mill job in Oklahoma. Six months pregnant and seriously ill with complications from the pregnancy, the woman sought aid to cover living expenses until she was well enough to be left alone and her husband could continue to search for work.

Under the new welfare policy, county officials said, she would receive $307 a month--the maximum benefit paid by Oklahoma--rather than the $565 benefit paid in California.

The couple, who have been living temporarily in a shelter, face possible homelessness because they cannot find an apartment to rent for less than $300 a month, according to the lawsuit.

The ACLU maintains that their financial hardships are typical of those that would be faced by new residents who have not lived in California for 12 months prior to applying for welfare.

“Because even the standard California grant for longtime residents is significantly below the federal poverty line,” the lawsuit said, “the further reductions imposed by these residency requirement cause irreparable injury . . . to the poor who are unable to feed, shelter, clothe and care for their families on their reduced grants.”

The lawsuit asked the court to declare the new policy unconstitutional on the grounds that it violates the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment by treating new arrivals to the state differently than established residents and because it stifles a poor family’s right to migrate.