We’re coming up on the fifth month of the year as we enter May, and Californian residents are awaiting the new round of payments from CalFresh, which will be distributed based on the last digit of their case number. Here’s the crucial details…

As Californians await their benefits, we must understand the deadlines and timeline in order to make their food purchases in the state-level version of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).

CalFresh is California‘s adaptation of the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which provides monthly benefits to low-income individuals and families, as long as they are eligible.

The benefits are designed to assist with the purchase of nutritious foods, which are distributed through an Electronic Benefits Card (EBT). CalFresh benefits can be used as a debit card at selected supermarkets to purchase the required foods.

It is important to clarify that this is not a loan and repayment is not required. The amount you receive, which depends on factors such as household size and monthly expenses, is intended to improve the health and well-being of low-income Californians.

CalFresh must be spent on approved foods and it cannot be spent on hot food, toiletries, alcohol, cigarettes, fuel and other non-food substances.

Who is eligible for CalFresh benefits?

The criteria for CalFresh Payments eligibility are among the simplest, but you must follow these guidelines in order to receive your benefits.

You must have been a California resident for at least the last 10 years.

The maximum household income level will be less than or equal to 200% of the federal poverty level. For a single person, the maximum gross income allowed is approximately up to $2,430, while a family of eight can have up to $8,428.

Have an Adjusted Net Income, which is used to determine the monthly benefit amount. Elderly and disabled households use net monthly income instead of gross income for eligibility evaluation.

If you are an able-bodied adult with no dependents (ABAWD), between the ages of 18 and 49, who is able to work and has no dependents, you are also eligible, but you can only receive three months of CalFresh payments within a 36-month period, unless a specific exemption applies.

If the household includes someone who is elderly (age 60 or older) or disabled, the net monthly income limit will be used for eligibility checks.

When are food stamps paid in California during May 2024?

CalFresh payments are disbursed through an Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) card within the first 10 days of each month. Payments on schedule for May 2024 are:

• May 1: The last digit ends in 1.
• May 2: The last digit ends in 2.
• May 3: The last digit ends in 3.
• May 4: The last digit ends in 4.
• May 5: The last digit ends in 5.
• May 6: The last digit ends in 6.
• May 7: The last digit ends in 7.
• May 8: The last digit ends in 8.
• May 9: The last digit ends in 9.
• May 10: The last digit ends in 0.

California now holds the ignominious prize for the highest electricity rates in the nation, except Hawaii. How did we get into this predicament?

Because the California Public Utilities Commission — the five-member agency appointed by Governor Gavin Newsom that regulates the prices, service and reliability of private energy utilities — has failed to do its job.

There are other government entities that hand out cookies to energy companies without a care for who pays the bill. But the buck stops at the Public Utilities Commission to protect utility customers.

When a private utility like PG&E decides it needs to build new infrastructure — say, to protect against wildfires — it’s the commission that determines if the infrastructure is necessary, if the utility’s proposed costs for that infrastructure are fair, and if better and cheaper alternatives exist.

The commission enjoys limited scrutiny by the courts. Decisions made by other state agencies can be appealed to Superior Court. But only an appellate court can hear commission appeals, and taking that case is discretionary. This limited judicial review means that the Public Utilities Commission essentially answers to the governor alone.

As a former commission president, I know what keeping energy prices down requires: a sharp pencil to control relentless spending requests from utilities that allow them to generate more profits, adherence to legal mandates that require it to protect ratepayers and allow only “just and reasonable” costs and the backbone to just say no to the utilities’ unceasing demands that customers pay for programs that are ineffective or unnecessarily expensive.

None of this is happening, and Californians should be outraged.

Last November, the commission authorized a historic rate increase — more than $2.56 billion for PG&E’s 2023-2026 general rate case spending estimates. PG&E applied to the commission to charge its customers for the costs of running its gas and electricity businesses, including new infrastructure, system maintenance, and employee and management salaries.

That rate increase hits in stages. The commission let PG&E charge its customers immediately for the first $1.3 billion, painfully hitting in January’s bills. But that’s not the end to commission-permitted rate increases: The utility will collect $716 million more in 2024, $359 million in 2025 and $204 million in 2026.

The commission allowed these increases despite its administrative law judge’s initial decision finding that PG&E’s evidence justified a much smaller rate hike. (The commission employs administrative judges to independently vet whether or not utilities have proved that they are entitled to charge their customers for their costs.)

The administrative law judge’s decision hinged on whether PG&E’s spending was “just and reasonable” — the legal prerequisite for approving any utility cost. Instead, politically appointed commissioners overruled the judge and gave PG&E the vast bulk of what it wanted despite what the facts support.

Before the ink on PG&E’s unprecedented 2023 rate increase was dry, the utility came back, asking the commission to order its customers to pay over $4 billion more for Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant costs, power purchases from electricity generators and infrastructure upgrades for “energization” efforts.

PG&E wants $691 million of that upfront — paid now — before the Public Utilities Commission even evaluates whether those costs are just and reasonable.

Adding insult to injury, in its March 12 decision, the commission handed PG&E yet another increase of $516 million — to take effect immediately. This time the commission dispensed with pesky legal requirements for evidentiary hearings, testimony or proof of PG&E’s asserted costs. By not even attempting to evaluate the reasonableness of the utility’s demands, commissioners set a new low in disregarding the law, which allows the commission to increase rates only after it holds a hearing that includes testimony under oath and cross-examination of PG&E’s witnesses.

In its decision, the commission admitted that granting PG&E half a billion up front, based only on PG&E’s word, “departs from the general requirement to raise rates only after the costs are determined reasonable.” Despite PG&E’s admission that its original $5.7 billion expense estimate actually only totaled $2.7 billion, commissioners approved the increase anyway, only timidly admonishing that “PG&E should be more transparent at the outset to assist with decision-making.”

What should have occurred?

Formal hearings, with PG&E’s witnesses testifying under oath about the true amounts of their asserted costs. The commission should have followed the law that requires PG&E to prove that its costs are “just and reasonable” — before forcing its customers to pay more. The law requires public, rules-based fact determinations about what money is really needed to provide safe and reliable service versus what constitutes frivolous, unnecessary or profit-plumping projects.

The commission blithely maintains that it will review PG&E’s actual costs later — years from now. If unreasonable costs are found, it will order refunds of the money PG&E took from its customers.

But PG&E will almost certainly fight such refunds by scaring future commissioners into inaction, claiming that “the markets” have expected them to keep the money so it can’t be taken away.

Kowtowing to PG&E despite the evidence and the facts — or in this latest case, raising rates without any evidence or facts — shows the Public Utilities Commission’s utter indifference to the hardships these rate increases impose on California’s families and businesses.

Now, a new commission scheme is set to create a “fixed charge” on top of current pay-as-you-use prices, which would be marginally reduced, only for residential customers, under the plan.

On March 27, an administrative law judge published a proposed decision that, if approved in May, will impose a new fixed $24.18 monthly charge on residential customers not eligible for low-income discounts. The commission touts this proposal as a win because it set the charge significantly lower than the $70-$90 the utilities initially proposed. But the new charge still exceeds twice the national average for similar charges.

Fixed fees are the start, not the end, of more rate increases because the commission doesn’t prohibit the fixed charge from increasing whenever PG&E wants. The plan lacks safeguards against utility double-dipping, so it will be hard to tell whether the costs embedded in this new fixed charge are duplicated in other cost-recovery requests. Even PG&E’s low-income customers are not protected — they already pay more than the average customer in the Sacramento Municipal Utility District.

The Public Utilities Commission’s rubberstamping of unproven, unwarranted, unjust electricity costs must stop. It is up to the state Legislature to inject sanity into the regulatory system and protect California families and businesses from ruinous, undeserved rate increases.

Thankfully, legislators have introduced AB1999 to stop this increase and cap any fixed charge at $5 for low-income customers and $10 for other customers. AB2054 would stop the revolving door of former commissioners moving to jobs with utilities and scrutinize utility funds, and SB938 would stop ratepayers from paying for utility lobbying and advertising, among other reforms.

Passing these bills would be important first steps to reining in California’s rogue Public Utilities Commission and halting runaway energy rates.

More robust oversight by the Legislature is needed. Without it, you can expect your energy bills to continue to skyrocket.

Loretta Lynch is a former president of the California Public Utilities Commission and an attorney in San Francisco.

Harvey Weinstein may be getting a new trial in New York after the state’s highest court tossed out his 2020 felony sex crime conviction. But his case in California likely won’t face the same fate, according to Los Angeles prosecutors and legal experts.

In December of 2022, a Los Angeles jury found Weinstein guilty of several counts of sexual assault and was sentenced to 16 years in prison two months later.

The major difference between the two cases is how each state handles the admission of evidence of uncharged allegations. 

In California, state law allows the admission of allegations of sexual offenses not listed in the indictment — specifically in sex crime cases, in accordance with California Evidence Code section 1108. Prosecutors can bring forth evidence of a defendant’s past sexual misconduct, calling in witnesses whose accusations are not part of the charges against the defendant.

But in New York, no such law exists. In fact, the state specifically bars the admission of such evidence.

In its 4-3 decision Thursday, the state’s Court of Appeals described the allowance of such evidence during Weinstein’s trial as a series of “egregious errors.” In addition to several uncharged allegations of sexual misconduct, the Manhattan District Attorney brought forth evidence of things like Weinstein allegedly threatening violence against people who worked for him or photoshopping a female actor’s head onto another woman’s nude body. 

The New York appeals court described such evidence as “irrelevant, prejudicial, and untested,” portraying him in a “highly prejudicial light” while trying him on charges of first-degree criminal sexual act and third-degree rape. 

New York state law bars the admission of evidence of prior uncharged crimes or allegations in accordance with the “Molineux rule,” named after the landmark People vs. Molineux case. An appeals court acquitted Roland Burnham Molineux of murder in a ruling that established the “Molineux rule” as a constitutional safeguard protecting a defendant from the assumption of guilt because they committed other, similar crimes in the past.

In a statement, the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office said it was “saddened” by the New York appeals court’s decision. However, the DA’s office noted how the New York case is different from the one in California.

“The legal issues identified by the New York Court of Appeal are not present in the Los Angeles County case,” the DA’s office said.

Weinstein’s lawyer, Arthur Aidala, applauded the overturning of his New York conviction in accordance with state law.

“We knew Harvey Weinstein did not get a fair trial,” Aidala said during a news conference Thursday afternoon. “There are some people who are unpopular in society but we still have to apply the law fairly.”

Weinstein is currently incarcerated in New York at the Mohawk Correctional Facility.

On Friday, Gloria Allred called the conviction reversal a “cry out” for changes to New York state law. She called for a similar law  as the one in California during a news conference alongside her client, Mimi Haley, one of the victims in the New York case.

“In California, we have a specific statute,” Allred said, referring to Evidence Code section 1108, which allows such evidence in sex crime cases.

“I think it’s important for the New York legislature to pass a specific statute in New York, which more clearly defines the admission of prior bad acts, witnesses and their testimony in New York — and is more protective of victims’ rights,” Allred said.

Haley said hard evidence including witnesses corroborating her allegation against Weinstein should be enough to prove his guilt. Weinstein was convicted of forcibly performing oral sex on her at his New York apartment in 2006. The appeals court tossed out the conviction for that crime but did not appeal Weinstein’s third-degree rape charge involving another victim.

But Haley said evidence of Weinstein’s other alleged sexual misconduct should be considered relevant — whether or not he was actually charged for it.

“I personally do think it’s important information to know about somebody’s character and their pattern,” Haley said.

Allred said the conviction reversal could have a chilling effect on victims, making them more reluctant to come forward and testify before a jury. Meanwhile, prosecutors could decide against filing charges for fear of making too weak of a case, particularly when dealing with defendants who have the kind of resources and legal representation as Weinstein, she said.

“They may feel that it’s more difficult without (evidence of) prior bad acts to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, and therefore, they may decide not to charge the defendant or seek to indict at all — especially in high profile cases against the rich, the famous the powerful, well-connected defendants.”

While saying she does have some reservations, Haley said she would “consider” testifying against Weinstein in a new trial. She said preparing for the trial took two years and she faced harassment, but she wants to keep “speaking truth to power.”

“It’s a crucial moment in history to keep going and to keep standing up for truth,” she said.