A Whirlwind Year for the CalFresh Fruit and Vegetable EBT Program
By Eli Zigas and Grecia Marquez-Nieblas
The CalFresh Fruit and Vegetable EBT program had quite a year. It grew exponentially; helped tens of thousands of families afford healthy food; ran out of money; and most recently, received a fresh investment of $10 million from the state budget that will allow it to restart. It was a whirlwind 12 months, providing valuable data and continued momentum for fruit and vegetable supplemental benefits.
The pilot, originally established by legislation authored by Senator Scott Wiener in 2018, set out to answer the question: could the state develop a scalable technology to provide CalFresh families with additional money to support the purchase of fruit and vegetables. The answer, as seen in the data, was a resounding yes.
In March 2023, the program provided CalFresh households a total of $24,000 per month after launching at a few farmer’s markets in late February and at 2 grocery stores in March. By March 2024, the program had grown 100 fold -- providing a total of $2.5 million per month at 90 grocery stores and farmers markets. In just one year, the California Department of Social Services’ program became the largest healthy food incentive program – based on financial support provided to people -- anywhere in the country. And, importantly, during this time of rapid growth, the program did not need to increase its overhead costs.
This successful growth, however, meant that the $12 million dollars the state set aside for providing fruit and vegetable supplemental rebates to CalFresh participants dwindled rapidly. Based on its projections of different scenarios for how long the funding would last, the California Department of Social Services alerted all participating retailers in March 2024 that the program would be turned off on April 14, 2024. By the time the program was put on pause, it had, since its launch in Feb 2023, provided $10.5 million to 92,000 households – comprising roughly 159,000 people -- across 44 of California’s 58 counties. In its final month, CalFresh households were earning an average of $46 each month in rebates for the fresh fruits and vegetables they purchased.
Recognizing that this successful and popular program was on track to run out of money, Assemblymember Alex Lee led the charge to secure additional funding. At the start of 2024, he put forward a request for $30 million to keep the program going at its full scale for twelve months. Many other assemblymembers and Senators joined his request, including Senator Bill Dodd as a co-champion in the Senate. Outside of the Capitol, Fullwell and Nourish California led a coalition of dozens of organizations bolstered by a petition signed by more than 7,600 people from across the state calling for the funding to keep the program alive.
As California’s budget projections continued to paint a dismal fiscal picture, the chances of securing any funding – let alone the full $30 million needed to keep the program going at its current scale for twelve months – shrank. However, our coalition kept pressing for funding – noting that more than 99% of the $30 million in requested funds would go directly into low-income families’ pockets, which is a level of program efficiency that is crucial in lean budget times. In the final days of negotiation, the legislature’s budget leaders -- including Senator Wiener – and Governor Newsom agreed to invest an additional $10 million to keep the program going (see Senate Bill 108, Section 190, Item 26).
While this funding will not be enough to keep the program operating for twelve months at its full scale, it will provide critical momentum for the program to continue reducing hunger, improving health, and supporting California’s agricultural economy. And, importantly, the continued investment of state funds into the CalFresh Fruit and Vegetable EBT Pilot in a deficit year reflects the legislature and governor’s willingness to prioritize this important program. In the coming months, Fullwell will work with retailers, CDSS, and others to ensure that Californians get the most from the state’s renewed investment while also continuing to push to expand the program. And, looking further ahead, Fullwell will continue building on the strong foundation that the Calfresh Fruit and Veggie EBT Pilot established in its first, successful year and advocate for it to become a permanent supplement within the CalFresh program, available at grocery stores and farmers’ markets statewide.