California Department of Social Services - State Hearings Division
Notes from the Training Bureau - February 25, 1999

The following questions were submitted by Carol Ackley of Sacramento County.

Question 1:

We understand that we may not impose the increased time penalties established by CalWORKs until the client has received notice of the increased penalties. Is this also true in terms of imposing the different type of penalty (old deletion of individual vs. new aid payment reduction)? It is arguably an adverse action, because the sanctioned client must continue to participate in welfare-to-work and the IPV period counts toward their aided time limits.

Answer:

In CalWORKs a county may impose an increased time penalty prior to notifying the individual of such new penalty. The county may thus also impose a different type of penalty in CalWORKs prior to notifying the individual of the different type of penalty.

In Food Stamps, MPP §20-300.32 provides that the county may impose any "new" penalty only after it has notified the individual of such "new" penalties. There is no such comparable regulation in CalWORKs IPVs. In fact, the new CalWORKs IPV regulations adopted on an emergency basis effective July 1, 1998, state at MPP §20-353.3 that new fraud penalties (outlined in §§20-353.2 through .261) apply to individuals disqualified for committing an IPV act on or after January 1, 1998. If an act began before January 1, 1998, but continued after January 1, 1998, the new fraud penalties would apply.

In the absence of any CalWORKs regulation comparable to MPP §20-300.32, the counties may impose CalWORKs fraud penalties based upon the date the IPV act was committed regardless of whether the county has advised the individual of new fraud penalties.

Question 2:

Our county has been proposing more than one first (six-month) IPV, and has not been upheld. After the county brings forward and is upheld on an IPV, what are our options? Must the client actually serve the disqualification in order for the deterrent criteria to be met? Or, is the issuance of the decision and IPV notification sufficient for any subsequent act to count as a second IPV.

Answer:

With regard to the question of whether the county can request additional first disqualifications for acts that are discovered after the issuance of an IPV decision but which occurred prior to the issuance of that decision, the county’s actions are limited to recoupment of any resulting overpayment or overissuance.

The county may therefore not impose additional first disqualifications for acts that are discovered after the issuance of disqualification

The county may file a second or third IPV hearing request only if the later act of IPV has occurred during a period of time subsequent to the issuance of the IPV decision to the recipient. It is not necessary that the individual has served the disqualification. The critical factor is that the recipient has been given notice of the earlier disqualification.