With the federal shutdown ongoing, more than 1.3 million North Carolinians who receive federal food assistance could see partial benefits on their EBT cards early next week.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture, which oversees the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, said in a court filing Monday that it will exhaust an emergency reserve fund.
Patrick Penn, the deputy under secretary for Food and Nutrition Services, wrote that $4.65 billion left in the fund would be enough to pay for 50% of SNAP benefits in November. Once that money is gone, Penn warned, there will be no more funds for new SNAP recipients who sign up in November, food assistance for disasters or other unforeseen events.
In North Carolina, there are 1.34 million people who receive SNAP benefits, including about 580,000 children. Attorney General Jeff Jackson was one of 25 Democratic officials who joined a lawsuit trying to force the Trump Administration to use emergency funds Congress had appropriated for SNAP instead of foregoing benefits in November.
Friday, a pair of federal judges in Massachusetts and Rhode Island ruled that USDA needs to use the reserves.
In response to Monday's announcement, Jackson said in a statement, "The Agriculture Department has told the court it will use its entire emergency fund over the next month to make 50 percent payments to every SNAP recipient. That will zero out the emergency fund. My office is still reviewing the order to see what else we can do to help, but until this shutdown ends we all need to provide extra support to our local food pantries.”
Part of the frustration is that USDA is only offering half of typical benefits. That's because, the agency said, it can't dip into tariff funds that are typically used for child nutrition programs to fully fund SNAP.
While $300 million of those funds were used to fund the WIC women's and children's nutrition program last month, Penn wrote in the filing that about $4 billion to make SNAP whole is an entirely different scope and could threaten long-term funding for child nutrition.
The partial benefit offers at least some relief, N.C. DHHS Secretary Dev Sangvai said in a statement.
"This is good news for North Carolinians, even if we know it is not enough for the many families who continue to struggle to put food on the table. We know how important these benefits are, and we are doing everything we can to make sure people have access to them as soon as possible," Sangvai wrote.
Updating computer systems
Penn, the USDA official, also warned that it could take state governments some time to update their systems to reflect reduced benefits for November. States, Penn wrote, will need to recode their systems to adjust to the new amounts.
"For at least some states, USDA's understanding is that the system changes states must implement to provide the reduced benefit amounts will take anywhere from a few weeks up to several months," Penn wrote in the filing.
North Carolina officials say that is not the case here.
While DHHS was still awaiting formal guidance from USDA as of about 5 p.m., agency officials said they are working as quickly as possible to update its systems.
"At this time, we anticipate that partial November SNAP benefits will begin being added to existing SNAP beneficiaries’ EBT cards by early next week," Summer Tonizzo, a DHHS spokeswoman, wrote in a statement.
Food banks also received a boost late last week, even as the SNAP deadline loomed. Friday, Gov. Josh Stein announced the state is giving food banks $10 million in grants, while private partners are donating another $8 million.
"We will keep working to keep North Carolinians fed," Stein said in a statement Monday afternoon.
