Food Stamp Rolls Grow Deeper
Posted 03/31/10
Food stamp rolls growing deeper
N.C. households that depend on food stamps have increased 45% over the last two years.
By Matt Ehlers
matt.ehlers@newsobserver.com
Posted: Sunday, Mar. 21, 2010
As the economy continues to put people out of work, twisting lives in unforeseen and unimaginable directions, many more people have taken the dire step of asking for help with feeding their families.
In the past year, hundreds of thousands of additional people in North Carolina have joined the federal government’s food assistance program.The number of households in the state that depend on food stamps has increased 45 percent over the last two years. In February 2010, 1.31 million people – more than 1 in 7 North Carolinians – benefited from the assistance.
This deep shift in the food economy has had a number of logistical, extremely personal and even embarrassing consequences. People unaccustomed to asking for help have had to bare their family’s deep financial crises before strangers, navigating the sometimes complex world of social service offices and food pantries for the first time.
County governments are tasked in North Carolina with administering the federally funded food-stamp program, and many were stretched thin before the recession. New food stamp cases have dropped on them a crushing amount of work.
From paper to plastic
Technically, they aren’t called food stamps anymore. The old paper coupons have been replaced by Electronic Benefit Transfer, or EBT, cards. In North Carolina, the program is called Food and Nutrition Services.
It is not easy to qualify for food assistance. Most households cannot have more than $2,000 in what the government calls “countable resources,” such as money in a bank account. A home and its lot do not count. Neither do most retirement plans. A complex set of rules applies to vehicles.
A family of four can make no more than $2,389 in gross income per month and still receive food stamps. Families must provide proof of their income and expenses, and those who qualify must have their cases periodically reviewed to ensure they are still eligible.
The food assistance benefits are offered on a sliding scale.
The most important purpose of food stamps is to put food on people’s tables. But the money distributed on EBT cards also provides an economic boost to struggling communities. In February 2010, more than $169 million was put on EBT cards across the state. Two years earlier, the statewide number was around $90 million.
The increase in need has had tangible consequences for the county offices that handle food stamp applications. Caseworkers are overburdened, working for recession-hit counties who can’t afford to add new workers.
Support MANNA
