Court Opinion

ID: 9719151
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 07:43:44.641628+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:04.919619
License: Public Domain

FILES, P. J., Dissenting.
The majority opinion holds that the Aid to the Totally Disabled (ATD) statute is unconstitutional on its face, in that persons under the Old Age Security (OAS) and Aid to the Blind (AB) statutes receive payment for care rendered by relatives with whom they live, while persons under the ATD program do not. It is apparent from the face of the statutes that OAS and AB are much more generously funded programs than the ATD program which is here under attack. What is more important, the OAS and AB statutes provide for aid, including attendant care, in fixed dollar amounts for each person qualifying, while the ATD statute provides that benefits must be apportioned so as not to exceed an average grant of $100 per month.
Thus, under OAS, Welfare and Institutions Code section 12151 gives to each recipient a maximum of $170 per month, plus cost of living adjustments, and section 12152 authorizes an additional payment not to exceed $300 per month for attendant care or other special services. The AB program is similarly structured. (§§ 12650-12652.)
The amount of aid allowed for the needy disabled is set forth in section 13700 as follows (as amended in 1970): “For needy disabled persons qualifying for aid under the provisions of this chapter, there shall be paid an amount equivalent to the actual needs of the recipient as set forth in this section, but not to exceed an average grant computed statewide for all recipients of aid under this chapter of one hundred dollars ($100) per month. In the event the average grant per recipient exceeds an amount of one hundred dollars ($100), the department shall take immediate steps to re*575duce or curtail payments for attendant services or other special services arising from their disability to the end that the monthly average per recipient for the full fiscal year does not exceed one hundred dollars ($100).
“The department shall establish a standard of assistance, within the limits set forth in this section, which will enable each recipient to maintain himself in decency and health. The department shall establish a standard to cover actual needs, common to all persons. Within the limit of the average grant set forth in this section, the department may provide for payment of an additional sum to those recipients whose physical or mental condition is such that they require the services of a full- or part-time attendant or other special services. . . . Allowance for attendant services shall not be made when rendered by a responsible relative with whom the recipient is living, except when the director determines that the provision of such service is necessary to prevent the institutionalization of the recipient and cannot be obtained from any person other than the responsible relative.
“The department shall give priority to persons in the greatest need without replacing other public or private resources which can provide the services.”
Under OAS and AB, the grant of an allowance for attendant care has no impact upon the amount payable to any other recipient of aid. But under ATD all grants are interrelated. The statute puts a limit upon the total fund available—that is, $100 multiplied by the number of recipients in the program. Thus every dollar spent for attendant care for one recipient reduces pro tanto that which is to be divided among other recipients. The statute expressly commands that the department give priority to those in the greatest need, and to reduce or curtail payments for attendant services and other special services in the event the average grant exceeds the $100 limitation. It is quite reasonable to assume that a person who is receiving attendant care from a relative in his home is less in need than some other totally disabled persons.
As the majority opinion concedes, a welfare law may properly draw a distinction between persons who can receive assistance from a responsible relative and those who cannot. (See County of San Mateo v. Boss (1971) 3 Cal.3d 962, 967 [92 Cal.Rptr. 294, 479 P.2d 654].) I assume that the term “responsible relative,” as used in section 13700, is limited to those relatives who are under a legal duty to provide support.
In the ATD system, with limited funds, it is not unreasonable to refuse to pay for attendant care being furnished by a member of the household who is under a legal duty to furnish support, because the result is to make more funds available for other persons whose needs are greater. This reason *576for limiting attendant care does not exist in the OAS and AB systems, where the state has committee! itself to payment of a specified sum to each person who meets the statutory standard of need.
It is arguable that the ATD statute as a whole is unconstitutional upon the theory that there is no sufficient reason for being less generous with the needy disabled than with the blind and the aged. But the judgment of the trial court accepts the validity of the $100 average limitation. The judgment appealed from finds section 13700 unconstitutional only with respect to the limitation on attendant care payments to relatives living in the home. Defendants can comply with the judgment only by paying to plaintiffs money which otherwise would be paid to someone else.
If we accept the constitutionality of the closed-end financing of ATD, the limitation on payments to responsible relatives is a sensible means of carrying out the thoroughly commendable legislative purpose to distribute the limited funds to those whose need is greatest. By reason of the difference in financing, which the parties and the court accept as valid, persons under ATD are not “similarly situated” with persons under the AB and OAS programs.
It is argued that refusing payment to relatives will not save any money because these unpaid relatives will cease to provide care and thereby cause the state to pay for nonrelated attendants. There is no evidence in the record as to the actual fiscal impact of that provision of the law upon the program as a whole. Whatever it may be, the actual result is not the test. The statute is constitutional if the Legislature could rationally have believed that this provision would make more money available for those in greater need. In this area of economic regulation a statute is constitutional if it bears “ ‘some rational relationship to a conceivable legitimate state purpose.’ ” (See Sail'er Inn, Inc. v. Kirby (1971) 5 Cal.3d 1, 16 [95 Cal.Rptr. 329, 485 P.2d 529].)
I think the Legislature could reasonably have believed that some responsible relatives would care for a disabled member of the household, even without payment of the modest sum allowed for dependent care; and that the savings which would result would appreciably benefit others in the program. The possibility that the Legislature may have been mistaken in that assumption, or that some judges disagree with it, is not a basis for holding the statute unconstitutional.
When the judicial edict in this class action is engrafted upon the statutory system which requires that grants average only $100 per recipient, the benefits conferred upon the prevailing class necessarily reduce the meager *577stipends available for those in the greater need. Regrettably no champion has appeared on behalf of the class of persons who lose by this decision.
I would reverse the judgment.
Appellants’ petition for a hearing by the Supreme Court was denied February 23, 1972.