By Jason Hart | Ohio Watchdog
Ohioans’ reliance on food stamps decreased last year, yet it remains higher than at any time before the 2007-09 recession.
In December, more than one in seven Ohioans — more than 1.7 million of an estimated population of 11.5 million — received benefits through the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.
Based on Ohio Department of Job and Family Services records, a monthly average of 1,776,100 Ohioans got SNAP benefits in fiscal 2014, which ended in June. An average of 15.73 percent of the state’s population received SNAP benefits.
So, several years after the national recession, is an Ohio where 15 percent of residents are on food stamps the new status quo?
SNAP ADVOCATE: Lisa Hamler-Fugitt and the Ohio Association of Food Banks call for additional food stamp spending
“Yes, I do believe this is the new norm,” Ohio Association of Food Banks executive director Lisa Hamler-Fugitt said in an email to Ohio Watchdog.
Ohio’s recent decline in SNAP enrollment follows the reinstatement of work requirements for recipients in most counties at the end of 2013. The state had waived work requirements for able-bodied, working-age childless adults before President Obama’s 2009 “stimulus” bill.
“The decline in SNAP/Food Stamp enrollment in Ohio has been largely due to the state reimposing the time limit on unemployed/underemployed adults without dependents between 18 and 50 years of age who reside in 71 counties that were not granted the waiver,” Hamler-Fugitt explained.
Congress ending “a modest increase to SNAP benefits” from Obama’s stimulus and Ohio ending its statewide work requirements waiver have resulted in leaving nearly 134,000 adults subject to “harsh” SNAP restrictions, she said.
Without a work requirements waiver, able-bodied, working-age childless adults can only receive three months of SNAP benefits in any three-year period unless they work, volunteer or attend job training for at least 20 hours per week.
Hamler-Fugitt said the one in six Ohioans served by the Ohio Association of Food Banks who would qualify for SNAP under a statewide waiver “have lost over 235 million” federally funded meals “worth over $331 million” in the past 14 months.
Does the Ohio Association of Food Banks see any alternatives to the federal SNAP program?
“Charity will not and cannot fill the gap,” Hamler-Fugitt said. “Hunger is increasing, children are losing ground academically, seniors are going hungry and workers are less productive. Hungry people are not healthy people.”
She noted one in four Ohioans are now on Medicaid, “which has a higher income eligibility than food stamps.”
Ohio had fewer SNAP recipients in December than in the average month during fiscal 2014, and the 2014 average was lower than the average for 2013. The recent decline, however, followed several years of sharp spikes in the number of SNAP beneficiaries.
From 2004 to 2014, the average number of SNAP recipients in Ohio increased by 850,516, while Ohio’s population increased by just 109,153.
During fiscal 2004, an average of 925,584 Ohioans received SNAP benefits each month, 8.09 percent of the state’s population. The number of recipients increased gradually from 2005-08 before increasing dramatically in 2009, 2010 and 2011.
Ohio’s average monthly SNAP enrollment increased by 157,740 in 2009, 275,694 in 2010 and 196,403 in 2011. Monthly SNAP enrollment declined by 45,727 in 2014 only after additional increases in 2012 and 2013.
The national recession officially ended in June 2009, but the average number of Ohioans receiving SNAP benefits first topped 15 percent of the state’s population in 2011 and remained above 15 percent through 2014.
SNAP payments to Ohioans cost federal taxpayers just less than $3 billion each fiscal year from 2011-13, and cost nearly $2.7 billion in 2014. The state share of SNAP administrative costs totaled $97 million in 2013.
Josh Archambault, a senior fellow at the free-market Foundation for Government Accountability, said Ohio lawmakers should “continue to reorient their programs toward work first.”
“There is a window of opportunity for state legislators to re-examine welfare programs in general,” Archambault told Ohio Watchdog in a phone interview.
Archambault recommended Ohio end its policy of broad-based categorical eligibility, end its partial waiver of work requirements and impose asset limits for SNAP enrollees.
He said the state should also consider putting recipients’ photos on SNAP cards, which the state could not require but could offer as a default choice to help prevent fraud.
Archambault suggested legislators should be “thinking through the application process for SNAP, making sure that when individuals are coming in through that process that you are finding strength-based, work-oriented goals for them.”
“They will end up on a lot of your other social service programs, so you have to be mindful of how that application process happens,” Archambault said.
