NOW is the Time to Tell Congress: Do Not Take Food Stamps from Hungry People

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 The U.S. House of Representatives has passed a house farm bill that includes major changes to the SNAP program, also known as food stamps, that would decrease the amount of assistance nutritionally challenged people receive, make it more difficult to maintain eligibility for the program and place restrictive requirements on those receiving the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits.
            Last Thursday the Senate passed a different farm bill with far fewer restrictions on SNAP, which means the farm bill, including the SNAP program will likely go to a joint House-Senate Conference Committee, which will attempt to arrive at a compromise bill that would then have to pass both the House and the Senate.
Now is the time for interested supporters of the SNAP program to call their members of Congress, because provisions of the farm bill will begin to expire in September. This legislation includes subsidies and programs for farmers, and authorization for a number of rural and agricultural programs operated through the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The farm bill usually passes Congress with bipartisan support. 
            Some House members have called for SNAP food stamp cutbacks in light of the recent tax cuts bill, which effectively rolled back taxes mostly on high income individuals and corporations and has dramatically increased the deficit and the national debt. That rationale is ironic, however, in that the farm bill proposals include increases in some federal benefits for farmers and in several agriculture programs and the Agriculture Department’s farm trade programs. Both the House and Senate bills would increase support for the federal Conservation Reserve Program, which gives subsidies to farmers who allow idle land to remain out of production to support farm prices.
            Recent federal changes have already decreased monthly SNAP benefits to many Americans now eligible for food stamps, including SNAP recipients in New York. Any further SNAP benefit reductions, and any attempt to cut currently eligible recipients from the SNAP program, would be devastating to our clients and to the 2.8 million New York State SNAP recipients. Please take the time to call your Member of Congress and ask them to look out for this basic nutrition program for our neighbors in need. You can find out whom your members of Congress are, and connect to their offices, by calling 202-224-3121.
            The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) has released a study predicting enactment of the House version of the SNAP bill would knock more than 1 million low-income households - including well over 2 million people - off SNAP, on dramatically reduce their benefits. Many of these households are low-income working families with children.

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