California ‘failing victims’ of violent crime as financial support plummets

Hollins sees other, longstanding problems with the program. She said its terms can be restrictive in ways that advocates like her say disqualifies many of the people who live in communities hard-hit by crime and mass incarceration. For example, applicants have to cooperate with police and participate in court proceedings if an arrest is made and can’t be on parole or probation for a violent crime when they apply for compensation.

“Just because someone was on probation or went to prison doesn’t exclude them from being a victim if they are shot or injured,” Hollins said. “These sanctions create a cycle of unaddressed harm in our community that hurts everyone and leaves everyone unsafe.”

The victims’ compensation fund distributes some direct cash assistance in emergency situations, but the majority of its payments are reimbursements for expenses ranging from mental health counseling to mileage costs to and from medical appointments.

CalVCB is primarily funded through California’s Restitution fund, which is made of fines and fees that people convicted of crimes are required to pay. It is supplemented by other funding sources, including the state’s general fund, which is primarily financed by taxes, and federal dollars.

The amount of compensation awarded reached an all-time low in the 2021 to 2022 fiscal year, right when many communities were facing their second year of historically high homicides. Researchers are still exploring what caused the increase; officials, law enforcement and community advocates have pointed to a combination of pandemic-era stressors, a slowdown in courts and criminal proceedings and the pullback in in-person interactions among the people most likely to be involved in a shooting and staff with the programs that try to intervene in the violence.

Advocates like Hollins say that the decrease in awards has meant that Californians in need of immediate support after being the victim of a crime are left with few options for relief. The dynamic can leave them vulnerable to being re-victimized, because they can’t leave their neighborhood or their injuries can compound and worsen because they can’t get the proper medical care.

This decline in compensation is also set against the backdrop of concerns about an increase in crimes like shootings, burglaries and public drug use throughout the state that rose during the pandemic and has lasted into the current Trump administration. In California, these concerns led voters to pass Proposition 36, which enacted harsher penalties for retail theft, property crimes and drug offenses.

Prop 36 and other tough-on-crime policies in the state’s past have been sold to voters as a way to honor crime survivors who’ve already been traumatized and avoid creating new victims, Hollins said. But, the legislators who advocate for them continue to overlook the shortcomings of programs, like CalVCB, that are already in place but failing to meet the needs of the state’s most underserved victims.

“These tough-on-crime laws are put in front of voters with the narrative that we’re not doing enough to protect people who’ve been harmed,” Hollins added. “Meanwhile, the one program in the state that is supposed to respond to victims is not doing that.”