Public social services: SSI/SSP.

Existing law provides for the State Supplementary Program for the Aged, Blind and Disabled (SSP) , which requires the State Department of Social Services to contract with the United States Secretary of Health and Human Services to make payments to SSP recipients to supplement Supplemental Security Income (SSI) payments made available pursuant to the federal Social Security Act. Under existing law, benefit payments under the SSP are calculated by establishing the maximum level of nonexempt income and federal SSI and state SSP benefits for each category of eligible recipient. The state SSP payment is the amount, when added to the nonexempt income and SSI benefits available to the recipient, which would be required to provide the maximum benefit payment. This bill, for the 2015–16 fiscal year, and annually thereafter, would require the state maximum SSP grant for individuals to be readjusted and increased so that the state SSP payment and federal SSI payment, when combined, equal 112% of the federal poverty level. By increasing the amount of SSP payments, which are expended from a continuously appropriated fund, the bill would make an appropriation.