Pandemic Food Benefits: Only 2 States Approved To Date

About a month ago, the Families First Coronavirus Response Act created a pandemic electronic benefit transfer (P-EBT) program to give low-income families access to nutritious food while schools are closed. That law was enacted on March 18th and required states to submit, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to approve, plans to operate the new P-EBT program. USDA guidance to states followed on March 20th, specifying the process for submitting plans and obtaining agency approval. Now, weeks later, only nine states have submitted plans and only two, Rhode Island and Michigan, have been approved to date. Given that American households are reporting increased furloughs, layoffs, and unemployment applications, P-EBT could provide a critical lifeline for families when school meals are unavailable.

What Is P-EBT?

The P-EBT program enables states to temporarily issue EBT cards to low-income families with children who attend a school that offers free school meals, if that school has been closed for five or more consecutive days. The value of the P-EBT card would be at least that of free school meals for each child over a five-day school week, amounting to about $114 per month per child.

Who Is Eligible?

A state must first submit a P-EBT plan that includes information such as how the states will provide EBT benefits to families, dates of implementation, and the benefit amounts. Before households in a state can receive P-EBT benefits, the USDA must approve the state’s plan.

Unfortunately, state offices that administer the nation’s food stamp program (officially called the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP) are “struggling to respond to the growing number of families and individuals who are becoming eligible for SNAP benefits,” which could lead to these offices becoming overwhelmed if they do not carefully plan for the implementation of P-EBT, according to the Food Research & Action Center.

The P-EBT program is particularly interesting as it applies to both SNAP-participating households and those that do not currently participate in SNAP. Per the USDA’s recent guidance, households must have at least one child who attends a school closed for at least five consecutive days, and that child must otherwise be qualified to receive free or reduced-price school meals. As part of the states’ planning process, they must address how they will verify income information to establish eligibility.

Which States Have P-EBT Programs?

As of April 14, 2020, only nine states had submitted P-EBT plans: Arizona, Kansas, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, and Rhode Island. Of these, just Michigan and Rhode Island have received agency approval. In these two states alone, over 750,000 school children qualify for free or reduced-price meals. Families will now be able to offset the cost of meals these children would have otherwise consumed at school.

What’s Next?

The USDA has yet to act on the remaining seven state P-EBT plans, but it is expected to do so in the coming days. Even so, 41 states still have not submitted plans, which means that families in much of the country lack access to P-EBT benefits for which they are otherwise eligible.

Many advocates want to see expansion of the P-EBT program. According to Abby Leibman, President and CEO of MAZON, an anti-hunger organization, Congress “must do more: they must extend the term of these benefits to make certain they are available through the summer months; they must expand the eligibility for P-EBT to all Americans who need it; and the Administration must promote the program to every Governor, making it both easy and attractive for states to apply.”

P-EBT was not the only food assistance provision in the Families First Coronavirus Response Act. The law also allowed for emergency allotments of additional SNAP benefits, and USDA guidance has limited those allotments to the maximum level per household size. In a recent report, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) stated that the USDA’s interpretation will provide little relief to “any households already at the maximum benefit, which make up nearly 40 percent of SNAP households and those with the lowest incomes.” CBPP’s report added, the “reason households receive the maximum benefit is that they have no income available to purchase food under the SNAP benefit calculation rules.”

The Families First Coronavirus Response Act was among the first of several federal responses to the economic disruption caused by COVID-19. Congress subsequently passed the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, a stimulus bill estimated at over $2.1 billion, which did not expand benefits or eligibility criteria for SNAP. As Congress debates the next phase of economic recovery, many argue that the next bill should go even further to expand the nation’s food assistance programs.

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