AB 777 Disaster CalFresh Transparency and Reporting Act

Friday, August 1st, 2025

After a flood, significant fire, or widespread power outage, families can be dealing with damage to their housing, food loss due to a lack of continual refrigeration, and reeling from the impact on their community as a whole.

Disaster CalFresh Transparency and Reporting Act, AB 777, is an Assembly Bill that directly affects California residents and hunger-relief in times of natural disasters, when food insecurity rates are higher. This bill, co-sponsored by the California Association of Food Banks, focuses on helping the social safety net for families during a disaster situation.

Current Law: AB 607

The current law, which comes from AB 607, was enacted in 2017 and requires the Department of Social Services (DSS) to maximize available federal food assistance and provide proper reporting measures and procedures for how to respond when there are significant power outages affecting disaster areas.

Though this is a great starting point and has worked to eliminate improper or limited reporting from utility companies after a natural disaster, it still leaves many underserved communities disproportionately impacted by climate change and its effects. This is especially true for areas where disaster strikes multiple ways, such as power outages during a fire, where food spoilage causes the need for future food costs, and additional loss of food costs.

Though there are allocated funds for the federal government to distribute to states through each county, this is short-term assistance that needs to be addressed quickly, which can make reporting difficult and leave some households without sufficient benefits. Areas where households have been affected by multiple disasters, though benefits of any sort are useful, don't receive enough to cover the total cost.

AB 777 Overview

The need for accurate, timely reporting from utility companies makes a great impact in disaster relief for households in need after a disaster, and AB 777 attempts to better address this issue that often leaves affected households behind, even in the wake of a disaster.

How does the bill address these issues?

This bill furthers efforts to provide for heavily impacted areas by requiring all data-sharing agreements and points of contact to be in place for both the utility companies and the DSS. This ensures smooth communication at all times, ensuring accurate reports of areas in need, and boosts accuracy in total benefits due to having all the needed information.

Communication can be difficult in areas devastated by a natural disaster, but having these agreements and contacts in place beforehand will shorten the reporting times, smooth the communications between companies and the DSS, and ensure fewer community members affected by the disaster are left out of federal assistance.

Wrap-Up

Disasters can't be negated, but taking proper care of those affected by them is necessary in preventing further hardship. Streamlining communication between organizations will offer a better chance of affected community members getting the benefits they truly need and lower the chance of folks being left behind.

If you'd like to know more about FARSB's advocacy, please visit: FeedingIE.org/advocacy