A California grandmother fights to retrieve $30,000 taken by San Diego County from her grandchildren’s survivor benefits. Counties take millions of dollars in federal benefits from foster children, says a lawmaker trying to stop it.
In December 2019, a month after her son’s death, Patricia Baca contacted the federal government to provide for her surviving grandchildren.
But forces are building to halt the practice, which advocates say has been in place for at least two decades. A growing number of states are banning it, and advocates are seeking to eliminate it in California through a court challenge and a bill set to be introduced in the state Legislature next week.San Diego County said it halted the practice last year and now saves foster youth’s benefits in reserve accounts for them. But it didn’t repay Baca’s grandchildren.
Acting on behalf of foster youth in their care, agencies can apply for and receive children’s Social Security benefits. Foster youth are at higher risk than other children of falling into poverty and homelessness in adulthood. A long-termin California in 2020 found that a quarter of former foster youth were sleeping in shelters or temporarily unhoused after exiting foster care.
Few of California’s roughly 50,000 foster kids get Social Security benefits, advocates say, but the state does not track how many have had their funds withheld by the counties. Bryan’s legislation, a placeholder that will be amended next week, has yet to be heard in a committee. It comes as other states and cities have already agreed to limit the seizure of foster youth’s benefits, including Illinois, Maryland, Connecticut and the cities of Philadelphia and Washington, D.C.
Marisa Lopez-Scott, staff attorney at the Youth Law Center, which is sponsoring Bryan’s bill, said this would help more children or their families continue receiving Social Security benefits even after leaving foster care. Those receiving supplemental security income could get it for the rest of their lives.Child welfare agencies should receive the money on behalf of foster youth only as a matter of last resort, according to federal regulations and state law.
The girls’ biological father died a few months before the second time the girls landed in foster care. Knowing their biological mother had been receiving survivor’s benefits on behalf of the children, Amy contacted the county and the Social Security Administration, to ensure another relative would get the girls’ benefits when they were in foster care.
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