This story originally appeared on WESA.
Despite a court ordering the federal government to pay at least partial November food assistance benefits, Pennsylvanians likely won’t see that aid anytime soon — due to an extremely complex and cumbersome process federal officials are requiring — according to state human services officials.
The state has ways it can quickly deliver partial benefits, but the federal government is “directing states to use the most complex and labor-intensive approach possible,” according to a bluntly worded letter sent Tuesday by Pennsylvania Human Services Secretary Val Arkoosh to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which administers the food stamp program.
A copy of the letter was obtained by WESA.
“This will only further delay availability of food assistance for nearly 2 million Pennsylvanians who are currently not receiving benefits to which they are entitled, and result in wasted taxpayer dollars and long-term harm to Pennsylvania’s SNAP program.”
State officials are asking the federal government to allow them to use a swifter method to calculate each household’s partial payment — essentially giving everyone 50% of their normal SNAP allotment. This quicker approach was previously permitted during President Trump’s first term to issue pandemic-related benefits, according to Arkoosh.
“This is an existing, understood practice that states can employ as necessary,” she wrote.
Trump administration officials said last month they would not pay November SNAP food assistance benefits during the ongoing government shutdown, despite contingency funds being available that could cover at least a portion of the roughly $8 billion cost. On Friday afternoon however, two separate federal judges ruled the administration had to use available funds to cover either full or partial benefits.
But the procedure laid out by federal agriculture officials on Tuesday for how states should calculate partial benefits is extremely cumbersome, according to Arkoosh’s letter.
Using the process federal officials are mandating would require “completely restructuring Pennsylvania’s core eligibility and case management system,” which Arkoosh estimates would require “10,000 hours of work and depending upon the size of the team available, a minimum of 9-12 business days.” However, those projections could grow as the vendors Pennsylvania would need to complete the process would likely be needed by every other state as well, her letter says. It would likely take an additional 10 days after that to issue benefits following the system overhaul. The same amount of work would be required after the government shutdown ends to return the state’s systems to normal to distribute full monthly benefits.
Such a complex process also risks errors at a time when the state can ill afford them. President Trump’s budget bill, passed earlier this year, penalizes – up to hundreds of millions of dollars – states whose SNAP error rates are too high.
