![]() “So people can’t save for retirement, they can’t save to educate their children, they can’t save for emergencies, they can’t have additional vehicles to get additional family members to work,” Book said. ![]() The new asset test would disqualify low-income Iowans for SNAP benefits if the value of their personal liquid assets - including checking and savings accounts, and personal property excluding one vehicle - hit a $15,000 cap. Last March, the organization served 110,000 individuals, she said. ![]() Instead, Book said the food bank has experienced higher demand this year, after Iowa joined the handful of states that ended pandemic-era enhancements to SNAP payments before they expired nationally March 1. “They continue to say, ‘We’re going to beat down unemployment benefits, we’re going to beat down SNAP benefits, because this will produce more workers,’ and we’ve not seen it.” “We had national Republican Party politics playing out in our legislative agenda this year,” said Michelle Book, CEO of the Food Bank of Iowa. Some critics of these moves see less of a locally tailored policy approach than a partisan campaign for a long-standing conservative goal. State lobbying disclosures show the OSP paid $14,250 to a consultant who lobbied for the bill, which was sent last week to Republican Gov. The new rule would factor the value of liquid assets, including personal property like cars, into the income limits for receiving food assistance or Medicaid - a policy known as an asset test. Iowa’s Republican supermajority passed a bill in April taking a different approach. Steve Christiansen called up an OSP representative to explain it to lawmakers. In a Utah House hearing in 2021 on a nearly identical proposal, Republican Rep. Kevin Andrus presented FGA senior research fellow Scott Centurino to provide “national context.” When a health department official testified that the proposal could shrink federal funding for the state’s SNAP program, Andrus countered, “This legislation helps individuals to get on their feet and working.” In a committee hearing, Republican state Rep. Last March, a GOP supermajority in Idaho enacted new limits on the state’s ability to waive SNAP work rules for recipients in high unemployment areas. In line with that modular approach, work requirements aren’t the only policy tool the group endorses to prod recipients of public support into the workforce. But as Bragdon put it, “Our business strategy is to provide a menu of reforms, but then for state or federal policymakers to decide what makes the most sense for them to advance, given their dynamics and climate.” The FGA’s annual report includes a map of 33 “states of opportunity for 2023,” labeled either “redder and better” or “same and steady.” The think tank supports “universal work requirements for welfare programs” across the board. But the think tank and its lobbying arm have been a driving force on those issues - often serving as the sole providers of research presented in state legislatures to support the idea that tighter access to safety net programs spurs more people to work. That tally was up 3.2% from a year earlier but reflects the month before enhanced pandemic-era benefits expired for millions.īragdon, a former state representative from Maine who has served as the foundation’s CEO and president since launching it, estimates only about 20% of the FGA’s policy work addresses welfare and unemployment. More than 42.5 million people were enrolled in the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program as of February, the latest data available, receiving an estimated $6 per day for help buying groceries. One aid organization feared drawing attention to its efforts, worried about triggering an FGA lobbying blitz to curb food stamp payments in its home state. In recent interviews, half a dozen hunger relief groups across the country named the FGA as their top adversary in an escalating policy fight over safety net benefits, citing the group more frequently than any other. That is partly because of the state-level strategy with which the FGA has been quietly racking up wins, despite lacking the clout or funding of major conservative K Street institutions that also support shrinking the federal safety net. While the White House and Republicans now turn to selling their pact to lawmakers in both parties, low-income people in many states already face narrowing access to key benefits programs regardless of how the high-wire debt limit fight unfolds in Congress.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |