Federal Financial Participation

Once financial eligibility has been determined and a payment is to be issued, the EW must determine whether the persons in the AU are to be paid as federal. For purposes of this determination, the following groups are used:

  • Federally eligible persons.
  • Essential persons — claimed as federally eligible.

Below is a brief description of each group.

Federally Eligible Children

Federally eligible children are those:

  • Who are deprived of parental support and care because one or both of their parents are deceased, incapacitated or absent, or
  • Whose parent (both parents in a two-parent family) are CalWORKs time-expired, and
  • Meet the non-linking eligibility factors:  age, property, residence, financial status and institutional status.

Note:  A CalWORKs eligible child must be both deprived and needy, meaning that the child meets the requirments of all necessary linking and non-linking eligibility factors.

Federally Eligible Adults

A federally eligible adult is:

  • The caretaker relative of a federally eligible child or of a child who is receiving SSI/SSP, Foster Care, or Kin-GAP who would otherwise meet the conditions to be a federally eligible child.
  • The second parent of any federally eligible child or of a child who is receiving SSI/SSP who would otherwise meet the conditions to be a federally eligible child, when the deprivation of at least one child is the incapacity or unemployment of a parent who meets the federal eligibility conditions.
  • The spouse of an incapacitated caretaker relative when the caretaker relative is a parent of a federally eligible child.

Pregnant Person Only

A PPO is federally eligible if all of the following conditions are met:

  • The PPO is not federally eligible in another AU.
  • The sworn statement (for the initial 30 working days) or medical verification of the pregnancy has been provided.
  • Effective 7/1/22, a PPO is eligible at any stage of the pregnancy.
    • Prior to 7/1/22, a PPO had to reach the second trimester of the pregnancy (beginning of the fourth month to the end of the sixth month of pregnancy).
  • The child, if born and living with the birthing parent, would have been eligible for CalWORKs in the month of payment.

Note: Teen mothers, in a PPO case, have always been federally eligible for the entire length of their pregnancy, once CalWORKs eligibility is established.

Essential Persons

An essential person is the stepparent or the ASP who is not an otherwise federally eligible person and who:

  • Is related to a federally eligible child, or
  • Is related to a child who is either receiving SSI/SSP or sanctioned by Employment Services who would otherwise be a federally eligible child.

Example Example The family consists of a mother, her 2 children by a previous marriage, and her husband. They have no common children. He is not the children's father so there is no U-parent linkage. Deprivation is absent father. However, he is an optional person when determining the AU and he can be included in the AU as an essential person if the mother chooses. 

Related Topics

Financial Eligibility Determination

Applicant Gross Income Test

Recipient Net Income Test

Income Reporting Threshold (IRT)

MAP Levels

Examples of MAP Status

State-Only Payments