Enhanced Services for Asylees and Vulnerable Noncitizens program.

Plain English Breakdown

The bill summary and digest do not specify if the changes are substantive or nonsubstantive, but they appear to be significant.

Enhanced Services for Asylees and Vulnerable Noncitizens Program

This law changes eligibility criteria to allow people screened by U.S. immigration between January 1, 2024 and January 1, 2026 to receive services under the program.

What This Bill Does

• Changes the rules so that people who are screened by U.S. immigration between January 1, 2024 and January 1, 2026 can get services under this program.
• Requires these services to be given for up to 90 days within a year after someone is screened.
• Says that only nonprofits with at least one year of experience in providing help can receive grants or contracts from the state.
• Needs the department to collect information about how well the services work and share this on their website.

Who It Names or Affects

• People who are screened by U.S. immigration between January 1, 2024 and January 1, 2026
• Nonprofit organizations that provide help to people in need

Terms To Know

Asylum

Protection given by a country to someone who is fleeing their home because they are afraid of being hurt there.

Nonprofit organization

A group that does not make money for its leaders and works to help people or the community.

Limits and Unknowns

• The bill needs funding from the state budget to work.
• It only applies to people screened by U.S. immigration during a specific time period.

Official Summary Text

AB 548, as amended, Solache.
Enhanced Services for Asylees and Vulnerable Noncitizens program.
Existing law, subject to an appropriation in the annual Budget Act, establishes the Enhanced Services for Asylees and Vulnerable Noncitizens program to provide resettlement services for persons granted asylum by the United States Attorney General or the Secretary of Homeland Security or who are
vulnerable noncitizens. For purposes of the program, vulnerable noncitizens are persons who are
eligible to receive refugee cash assistance and services as victims of crime. Existing law requires the program, under the administration of the State Department of Social Services, to provide specified services for up to 90 days within the first year following a person’s grant of asylum or eligibility for services as a victim of a crime, respectively.
Existing law requires grants or contracts awarded under the program to be executed only with nonprofit organizations, as specified, with at least 3 years of experience with providing case management services and providing culturally and linguistically appropriate services. Existing law requires the department, in collaboration with service providers, to determine outcome metrics to define program success.
This bill would make technical, nonsubstantive changes to those provisions.
This bill would change the eligibility criteria to receive services under the program from asylees or vulnerable noncitizens, as described above, to persons who, among other things, are screened by the United
States Department of Homeland Security during January 1, 2024, to January 1, 2026, inclusive. The bill would require the program to provide services to an eligible person for up to 90 days within the first year following that screening. The bill would require grants or contracts awarded under the program to be executed only with nonprofit organizations with at least one year of experience with providing the above-described services. The bill would require the department to collect data from grantees related to the outcome metrics described above and post the findings on its internet website.

Current Bill Text

Download Bill PDF