Victims of violent crime in California are finding it increasingly hard to get support from the state, a new analysis has found, a development that has locked some of the most vulnerable people out of funds to help cover crime scene cleanup, relocation costs, funerals and therapy.

California established the nation’s first victims’ compensation program in 1965, aimed at helping victims of violent crimes and their families cover some of the costs sprung onto them by the violence.

A new report from Californians for Safety and Justice (CSJ), a non-profit that advocates for communities that are overrepresented as victims of crime and in the criminal justice system, has found that since 2019, the California Victim Compensation Board (CalVCB) has been awarding less to victims and denying more applications for relief, despite having more money in the fund.

The amount of money distributed by CalVCB has dropped from about $65m in fiscal year 2019 to 2020, to about $50m in the 2024 to 2025 fiscal year, a decrease of more than 30%, a CSJ analysis of CalVCB’s annual reports concludes. The award amount hit a five-year low in 2021, when $46m was allotted to victim reimbursements.

Meanwhile, the number of people applying for awards but being turned down has gone up. In 2019, CalVCB denied almost 5,000 of the nearly 47,000 applications it received. In 2024, the most recent year data is available for, CalVCB denied about 10,250 of 25,000 applications.

“It’s the state’s responsibility to the victims of crime and our communities to make sure they’re making good on our tax dollars,” said Tinisch Hollins, CSJ’s executive director. “But since 2019, the state has been failing victims. They have not been getting the support they deserve and that’s directly tied to public safety.”

The denials are not related to a drop in overall funds. CalVCB’s budget has increased, from $56m in 2019 to nearly $80m in 2022. It’s remained at that level since.

CalVCB did not respond to questions about why its payouts have dropped. In its annual report for 2023 to 2024, CalVCB stated that most denials occurred because applicants “had not provided all required documentation on time”. The program said an increase in applicants had led them to change their process in a way that then led to more denials based on the lack of timely documentation.

In a statement, the program said it was “committed to providing financial assistance to victims of crime to help them restore their lives”, and they encourage people who have been victims of crimes, as well as their family members, to apply for compensation.

Hollins said that many of the victims she and CSJ work with are unaware of the victims’ compensation program. Some who do apply are daunted by the process and give up, she said. Others hear stories about other people in their communities being denied and become discouraged from applying. “There are fewer applicants because people gave up on applying,” Hollins said. “For years, these dollars have just been sitting there.”

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 such as 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, including 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.”