New rules make it harder for working poor to get food stamps

Trump administration’s new food stamp rules will make it harder for Kentuckians to get aid

By early afternoon, every other Friday, a line forms outside the public library in Paducah for the 4 p.m. free meals a local charity hands out.

Many are the working poor, showing up in uniforms from cleaning services, fast food restaurants or other low-wage jobs, said Bryant Hileman, executive director of Project Pomona, a volunteer group he organized to feed the hungry in McCracken County.

With so many people already struggling, Hileman said he can’t understand why the Trump administration announced Wednesday it will tighten rules that already require some “able-bodied” adults who get food stamps to report work hours of at least 20 hours a week or lose their benefits.

It’s a move projected to kick about 700,000 people off the program nationwide.

“I think it’s totally the wrong direction,” Hileman said. “The logic is, ‘We’re going to punish the poor because we know what’s better for them.’ That hasn’t gotten us very far.”

The new rule will have little immediate impact in Kentucky, where more than 25,000 adults without dependents already have lost food stamps since 2018 under existing work rules enforced by the administration of Gov. Matt Bevin, according to the Kentucky Center for Economic Policy.

Previously, most Kentucky counties had been exempt from existing federal requirements under “waivers” allowed in areas affected by economic hardship. But the Bevin administration allowed those waivers to expire, making almost all Kentucky counties subject to current work reporting rules, said Dustin Pugel, a policy analyst with the progressive research center based in Berea.

“This rule doesn’t have any meaningful effect on folks now,” Pugel said. “We’d already let all those waivers expire.”

Only eight Eastern Kentucky counties are still exempt because they are part of a federal pilot program. But their waivers expire Jan. 1.

The new rule was announced Wednesday by U.S. Agriculture Department Secretary Sonny Perdue, whose agency oversees the nation’s $60 billion Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, previously known as food stamps.

Perdue said the change, which takes effect in April, is meant to make people more self-sufficient at a time when the economy is strong and unemployment is low.

“We need everyone who can work, to work,” he said, according to a USDA press release.

The rule applies to adults ages 18-49 without dependents who are deemed able to work.

But Pugel said research shows most adults who get food stamps and are able to work do so, but can’t always get regular hours to meet the 20-hour a week requirement or have seasonal jobs with hours that fluctuate. Furthermore, he said, some have difficulty reporting their hours or may not understand the requirement.

“Mandating that someone report a certain number of hours doesn’t work,” he said.

The new rule makes it much harder for states to get waivers from the existing work rules. That makes it is unlikely Gov.-elect Andy Beshear could get relief in the future for Kentucky counties should the state’s economy falter and the need for food stamps increase, Pugel said.

“In the short term, I don’t think it means a whole lot,” Pugel said. “But it’s a really sweeping rule that ties the state’s hands from being able to help folks get food assistance during a downturn or in an economically distressed area.”

Under the existing rule, 114 of 120 Kentucky counties would be eligible for a waiver from reporting work hours, should the state seek one, he said. Under the new rule, only around 30 counties would qualify, Pugel said.

Currently, about 507,000 Kentuckians get help buying food through the federal program — including 258,000 children, 63,000 people over age 60 and 317,000 people ages 18-59, according to the center.

About 51,000 are adults without disabilities or dependent children who are subject to reporting work hours to keep SNAP benefits, the center found in a report in April.

The average SNAP payment per U.S. household is about $254 per month, according to a November report by the Urban Institute. In Kentucky, Pugel said, that averages out to $1.32 per meal.

The program, funded entirely by the federal government, also puts money into the economy.

James Ziliak, director of the Center for Poverty Research at the University of Kentucky, told a legislative task force earlier this year that in the 2018 fiscal year, Kentuckians received more than $850 million in SNAP benefits. Every dollar of a SNAP benefit generates $1.50 of economic activity, or nearly $1.3 billion in 2018, Ziliak said.

The money goes to about 4,500 grocery stores in Kentucky, ranging from “major supermarkets to mom-and-pop convenience stores,” he said.

In an op-ed piece published this week in the Arizona Daily Star, Perdue, the USDA chief, said the changes would “restore the dignity of work to a sizable segment of our population, while also respecting the taxpayers who fund the program.”

But Pugel and other advocates argue the Trump administration is attempting to do by regulation what Congress has refused to do in previous years when such changes were proposed for the federal Farm Bill, which includes the SNAP program.

The new rule was immediately denounced by advocates for the poor nationally and in Kentucky.

Read this: Kentucky benefits task force makes only minor recommendations

The Rev. Kent Gilbert, president of the Kentucky Council of Churches, objected to Perdue’s claim the changes would help people find “the dignity of work.”

“I think that statement makes rich people with jobs feel better,” Gilbert said.”I think the idea of cutting them back and saying this is so you will have dignity is a ridiculous premise. I think it’s as cynical and mean-spirited and anti-Christian as it can possibly be.”

In Paducah, Hileman said his volunteer organization remains committed to trying to provide food to the hungry without questioning them about their income or work status. Hileman runs the nonprofit out of his home, working nights and weekends after his job.

“We really do believe food is a human right,” he said. “I work full time and as a private citizen, hand out hundreds of meals. I shouldn’t have to do that in this country.”

By Deborah Yetter
Louisville Courier Journal