Can my parents add my child to their CalWORKs case if I withdraw from my own case?

First, just to clarify - are you talking about CalFresh (food stamps) or CalWORKs (Cash Aid)? They're different programs. It sounds like you might be referring to CalFresh with the $23 food benefit, not CalWORKs which is cash assistance. This matters for the answer.

For CalFresh (food stamps), household composition is based on who purchases and prepares food together. If your parents have a separate CalFresh case, the county is already considering you as separate households for some reason. To answer your question: If you withdraw from your own CalFresh case, your parents could potentially add your daughter to their case IF they purchase and prepare food for her. But there are important things to consider: 1. Your parents would need to report this change to their eligibility worker 2. They'd need to verify they're the primary food providers for your child 3. Your income might still be counted if you contribute to household expenses 4. The increase might not be as much as you hope due to household size calculations Also, if you're receiving any CalWORKs cash aid (separate from CalFresh), removing your daughter could affect that completely.

did u report ur parents rent to calfresh? if u pay them rent and utilities separate that might be why ur gettin treated as separate household but if u guys all eat together u should prob be ONE household on calfresh not 2 difrent cases. i think someone at the county messed up.

Something doesnt add up here. If you all live together and eat together, you SHOULD be on one CalFresh case together already. The fact that you have seperate cases means either someone at eligibility got confused OR there's something about your living arrangement they interpreted differently. Honestly it sounds like you actually all need to be on ONE case together - you, your daughter, AND your parents. And that should give you a higher benefit than the two separate cases. Call the county and ask to speak to a supervisor about household composition rules for CalFresh. I was stuck on hold for 2+ hours trying this last month until I found this service called Claimyr (claimyr.com) that calls for you and then calls you back when a real person answers. They have a video showing how it works: https://youtu.be/jzISHxCPLwE - saved me from wasting half my day on hold. Worth it to get this sorted out properly.

This is a common confusion with CalFresh. Here's the actual rule: if you live together AND buy/prepare food together, you must be on the same CalFresh case regardless of who pays what bills. The only exceptions are if: 1. You're 60+ or disabled AND buy/prepare food separately from others in the home 2. Foster children (they can be separate) 3. Roommates who truly never share food Based on what you described, you all should be on ONE case together. This would likely result in a higher total benefit than having two separate cases. The county probably made an error during intake. I recommend not just withdrawing, but instead requesting a case review and asking them to combine the households if you're truly purchasing and preparing meals together. This is called a "household composition review.

THE COUNTY WORKERS DONT CARE!!!! they just want to close cases and move on!!! i had similar situation with my sister living with me and they kept saying we needed seprate cases even when we ate together because we "buy food seprate" which wasnt even true!!! took THREE APPEALS to fix it and then they tried to say i commited fraud!!! the system is BROKEN

we had this same problem last year my mom and me and my kid had 2 seprate calfresh cases and we only got like $40 for me and my son. when we fixed it and got put on 1 case the benefit went up to $340 for all of us!! definitely worth fixing

i had to call a bunch of times and finally got someone who knew what they were talking about! they had me submit a statement saying we all buy and cook food together and then they fixed it on the next benefit month

Quick update - I just used that Claimyr service I mentioned to get through to CalFresh about something else, and it worked great. Got a call back in 20 minutes instead of waiting on hold forever. If you're busy with work and can't sit on hold, definitely check it out.

Update: I took everyone's advice and called about combining our cases. It took forever to get through (wish I'd seen that Claimyr suggestion earlier!), but I finally got someone helpful. They're reviewing our case to combine everyone into one household since we do all eat together. The worker said our benefit should increase significantly - instead of $23 for me/daughter and about $120 for my parents, we should get around $380 for all four of us! Thanks everyone for helping me understand this wasn't about adding my daughter to their case, but fixing how our household was set up in the first place!