Will California offer more help to undocumented workers? The clock is ticking

As the clock ticks down for California’s Legislature to offer more help to undocumented immigrants and other families in need, communities across the state rush to get money in the pockets of vulnerable people so they can make ends meet during the pandemic.

Groups have mobilized to fill gaps left by insufficient state funding for undocumented workers, those left out of federal aid, and others who were struggling financially even before the pandemic hit, community leaders say.

Experts have said the state’s $125 million disaster relief fund for undocumented workers will only be enough to assist about 150,000 people - in a state with an estimated 2 million undocumented residents.

On the first day the state began to take aid applications, undocumented workers flooded the program’s website, causing it to crash, and phone lines were clogged with calls.

Nonprofits lead some of the efforts, others are being carried out by private-public partnerships and through proposed public policy.

Through her Dolores Huerta Foundation, civil rights icon Dolores Huerta celebrated her belated 90th birthday on May 31, raising money that will go toward families in the Central Valley and the state’s high desert area. A total of $400,000 was raised.

Ana Padilla, executive director of UC Merced’s Community and Labor Center, said there’s also a need for the Legislature “to consider the profound historical and humanitarian aspects of the crisis and to develop public policy that doesn’t exempt certain Californians and their families from a safety net.”

“We estimate that 688,000 non-citizens immigrants — many without legal status or access to a safety net — have suffered unemployment since the pandemic commenced,” she said. “Hundreds of thousands of undocumented workers and their families and children are going through this pandemic without so much as traditional unemployment benefits or a stimulus check.”

WILL THE STATE HELP?

A proposed wage replacement program that would provide a $400 weekly payment to unemployed and underemployed undocumented workers didn’t make it into the proposed budget reached by the Senate and Assembly in early June.

It’s “not too late to include this program for undocumented workers,” Padilla said. The Legislature is now in budget negotiations with Newsom, and a final budget must pass by Monday.

On June 5, dozens of academics from universities across the state sent a letter to Newsom expressing their support for the program. Newsom’s office didn’t respond to requests for comment this week.

“Undocumented workers have been central to building California’s economy — the fifth wealthiest on the planet — but are now experiencing the greatest economic disaster in our nation’s history with virtually no safety net,” the letter reads.

This population group is “now bearing the brunt of the joblessness crisis,” according to the letter.

Kim Ouillette, attorney and fellow for with Legal Aid at Work, said her organization would continue to call on Newsom, President Pro Tem Toni Atkins and Speaker Anthony Rendon to “prioritize” the program in the state’s budget.

“We also believe there will be opportunities for the legislature to take important steps towards achieving this in the coming months,” she said last Thursday. “We will not stop fighting for undocumented workers to get income replacement, because we know their lives are essential and because we cannot continue to live in a state where a tenth of our workforce is denied access to our basic social safety net.”

State Senator Melissa Hurtado said she’s in favor of making sure the pandemic doesn’t result in increased homelessness, food insecurity or illness.

Assemblyman Joaquin Arambula, who is the chairman of the Assembly Budget subcommittee on Health and Human Services, said he is focused on protecting the most vulnerable, including undocumented immigrants. He said he’s been advocating in the state’s Latino Legislative Caucus, which urged Newsom to create the $125 million fund.

“The caucus and I also want to save programs that were in the proposed January budget that I believe will help working families get through this economic crisis,” Arambula said in a statement. “There is emerging support for a child tax credit program for low-income immigrant families that would provide $1,000 per child per year up to the age of six when the family files with an (individual tax identification number.”)

Alissa Anderson, senior policy analyst for the California Budget and Policy Center, said the amount of funding proposed by legislators for the tax credit expansion was not yet available. But based on an analysis her organization conducted, its estimated cost for the state would be between $44 million and $62 million.

It’s estimated that California spends about $63 billion on corporate tax breaks overall, she said.

“We are talking about just a drop in the bucket,” Anderson said. “A lot of the state’s tax credits ... go towards people who are wealthy.”

“It’s really unfair and it would make a lot of sense for California to include these tax filers,” she said. “They make a significant contribution to the state.”

COMMUNITIES RACE TO GET MONEY IN PEOPLE’S HANDS

Lindsay Callahan, president and chief executive officer with United Way Fresno and Madera Counties, said she can’t wait to get more people money.

Her organization is in its second round of giving money out to those in need. On May 26, it began to take applications for a pilot program that aims to provide aid to families for the pandemic’s recovery phase. As of Thursday, there were 2,765 applications, and the window to apply will remain open through June 19.

Aside from money, the program also provides coaching to families and hopes to distribute ongoing financial support. For the second round, it has about $700,000 left to give out. The funds target the most vulnerable people, such as undocumented workers, African Americans, single mothers and former foster youth with $500 per family.

For both rounds of money give away, United Way of Fresno and Madera Counties raised about $1.8 million, but Callahan said her organization needs to raise about “$5 million to continue to support the community as it comes out of this disaster.”

Another example of what other communities are doing to help their residents, especially the undocumented, is raising funds through private-public partnerships, such as in the city of Los Angeles.

Rick Jacobs, chief executive officer for Accelerator for America, said his organization and Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti in March realized that many people were going to need money.

In partnership with Garcetti, Accelerator for America launched the Angeleno Campaign, which has raised about $20 million since March. The program began to offer families money on April 22.

As of late May, the program had given out about $14.8 million to families meeting the criteria. Eligible families, depending on the number of people in the household, can receive a minimum of $700 and a maximum of $1,500.

“By the end of three days, we had 455,000 applicants,” Jacobs said.

Of those, some 150,000 were Los Angeles residents, which was one of the criteria for eligibility. Immigration status was not a part of the criteria, Jacobs said.

“We know that we are getting money to a lot of undocumented people because of the demography,” he said.

Jacobs said his organization is in the process of offering the program’s template to other cities and states interested in replicating the effort.

Mark Standriff, spokesman for the city of Fresno, said the city “has already provided a considerable amount of funding to assist residents, regardless of status, who have been impacted by the pandemic including $1.5 million for the Housing Retention Grant program.”

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