• News Feed
  • Youth In Foster Care Won Big Last Year—Now We Need to Speak Up Again!
June 6, 2025

Youth In Foster Care Won Big Last Year—Now We Need to Speak Up Again!

Last year, young people in California’s foster care system helped win a huge victory! In 2024, after lots of advocacy and hard work by youth in foster care, a bold new law passed with full support of Governor Gavin Newsom, establishing a new rate structure called the tiered-rate-structure. This groundbreaking new structure will provide funding based on the individual needs of each youth in care rather than the placement type and will support more youth to live with families. The rate structure includes two new funding streams:

  1. Immediate needs dollars that provide flexible money for tailored support and services.
  2. Strength building dollars that would give every youth at least $500 a month to use on enrichment and extracurricular activities that help them grow, like sports, art, or job training.

All of this was to start in 2027 and would be a game changer for youth who are in the foster care system and independent living.

On May 14, the Governor went back on his promise to provide the necessary funding to make this happen. His May Revise includes a trigger proposal where the state will no longer commit the funding for the new rate structure and will now “wait and see” if funds are available in 2027 to move forward.

We Need Your Support

Please contact the Governor and state budget policymakers and tell them to keep their promise. Youth in foster care deserve a budget that honors their resilience and follows through on the commitments the state has already made.

We cannot allow Governor Newsom to balance the state budget on the backs of children and youth in foster care. Attaching future foster care payments in 2027 to the budget deficit in 2025 causes unnecessary and destabilizing uncertainty for youth in foster care and the individuals who support them.

Tell Governor Newsom and state budget policymakers to stand with us in the advocacy community— and with children, youth, and families in the foster care system — by moving forward with the new Tiered Rate Structure now without unnecessary delays and unacceptable conditions like the funding trigger.

  • Governor Gavin Newsom: (916) 445-2841
  • Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas: (916) 319-2029
  • Senate President pro Tempore Mike McGuire: (916) 651-4002
  • Assembly Budget Chair Jesse Gabriel: (916) 319-2046
  • Senate Budget Chair Scott Weiner: (916) 651-4011
  • Assembly Budget Subcommittee Chair Corey Jackson: (916) 319-2060
  • Senate Budget Subcommittee Chair Akilah Weber Pierson: (916) 651-4039

For more detailed information and longer talking points, contact Kristina Tanner at the Youth Law Center, (530) 781-4271, ktanner@ylc.org.