Welfare managers say they are cutting back on equipment purchases and curtailing hiring to prepare for what could be the worst midyear budget cuts in close to 30 years.

With no reserves to cushion the cutbacks proposed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, the county Human Services Agency is trying to maintain core services and avoid layoffs, Deputy Director Melissa Livingston said.

She and others say it's the clients who would take the biggest hit, even as their numbers continue to grow in a chilling economy. In 28 years, Livingston said, she has never seen cuts as deep and broad as those proposed for health and human services in the governor's plan.

Among them:

- State-paid benefits for Medi-Cal, the public health insurance for poor children, single parents, the elderly and the disabled. About 100,000 people draw the benefit in Ventura County. Anyone who qualifies is entitled to it, so the state is entertaining cutting optional services such as adult dental care, capping income levels for new applicants at a little over $15,000 for a family of four, and rolling back benefits for legal immigrants.

- Food stamps for most people are safe because they are funded by the federal government, but the plan would eliminate an optional California benefit for poor, legal immigrants starting in July.

- Cash welfare grants for families with dependent children would be cut by 10 percent, rolling back the average grant from $723 for a family of three to $651. They would be stopped for children after five years if the parents are undocumented, are drug felons or fleeing felons or won't meet work participation requirements.

- Supplemental Security Income, a program for people deemed too disabled to support themselves, would be cut back to the federal minimum. The new rate would be $830 a month for individuals, down $40.

- The state would provide domestic in-home services only to the most needy applicants and cut the wages of the caregivers to the minimum wage.

Some are concerned about a 3 percent reduction to agencies providing services to developmentally disabled people, such as aides who help clients live independently.

"It's going to hurt," said Fred Robinson, chief executive officer of Arc of Ventura County. "Our hope is not to reduce programs and services, and I think the Arc is going to be in a pretty good position to get through this. I'm worried about some of smaller agencies that don't have the size."

Health and human services consume almost 30 percent of state funds, making them the second-largest expense behind education.

The governor is proposing to slice almost $960 million from health and human services at midyear. That's 20 percent of the total spending cuts he's proposed to bring the current state budget into balance.

Next fiscal year, the reductions would rise to $3 billion, half of the cuts the governor says are needed to close the gap.