J. Jhondi Harrell, the founder and executive director of the , Center for Returning Citizens , (TCRC ), remembers life before food stamps.
When he was 12, his dad, a long-distance truck drivers, had a heart attack. That was in 1967, and the family’s financial well-being plummeted as his family became the sole company. To help make ends match, the family joined the food ranges in their , Levittown , group, which doled out income agricultural goods from the government.
” I have very good memories” , , Harrell , recalled. ” The butter was one of the best things you could get,” said one author.
Except it came three times after meal restrictions were supposed to be eliminated.
The Food Stamp Act of 1964, signed into law by President , Lyndon B. Johnson , on , Aug. 31, 1964, made food passports a permanent feature after many successful aircraft programs, allowing individuals in need greater decision by shopping in local grocery stores. Johnson said at the signing ceremony,” The food stamp plan will be one of our most valuable weapons for the war on poverty.”
The feeding of America
Food stamps usage exploded. In 1969, the country spent about$ 250 million on food stamps. By 1974, the deadline for states to fully implement food stamps, that figure escalated to around$ 4 billion ( about$ 25.5 billion in today’s dollars ). In fiscal year 2023, the federal government spent$ 112.8 billion on SNAP, or$ 211.93 per participant monthly.
Prior to 1974, some in need like , Harrell , and his mother still stood in line for surplus commodities like powdered milk, powdered eggs, and margarine. The early days of food stamps required a cash donation, but the surplus food distribution was free and provided a month’s worth of food.
” My mother was a good cook” , , Harrell , said, adding that a favorite meal was spaghetti and Spam.
But by the time Suzanna A. Urminska’s family needed food stamps in the early ‘ 70s, the eligibility requirements had been nationally standardized. Her parents were refugees from Czechoslovakia, who fled the communist regime and eventually made their way to , Hawaii. Urminska, a community food advocate from , West Oak Lane, spent her entire childhood on SNAP.
She was born in 1978, a year after the Food and Agriculture Act of 1977 passed, allowing the , U. S. Department of Agriculture, which administers the program, to determine the cost of a healthy diet and eliminating the purchase requirement. Additionally, SNAP or SNAP is now known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.
Defeat food insecurity
Johnson wanted to improve the nutrition of the recipients and raise the income of farmers. He described the law as” a reasonable and responsible step toward making full use of our agricultural surplus.” Today, about 500, 000 Philadelphians rely on SNAP benefits, but the country’s largest nutrition program has not yet eliminated food insecurity.
Across the city, 15 of every 100 households do n’t have access to affordable, healthy food on a consistent basis. That looks like skipping a meal, not eating enough, or going hungry all day. Additionally, food insecurity comes with a number of physical and mental health issues, including the stigma associated with using food stamps.
Harrell ‘s , mother, however, squashed talk of embarrassment. ” My mother’s philosophy was there is more stigma to being hungry”.
The personal price of food insecurity
Urminska remembers when paper stamps were replaced with the Electronic Benefits Transfer ( EBT ) card in the early 2000s as part of President , Bill Clinton ‘s , historic welfare-to-work law, the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act ( PRWORA ). It mandated that states switch over to the EBT system and gave them an , Oct. 1, 2002, deadline.
” At times, when I became a parent, I used the card”, Urminska said. ” It seems to have made]using food stamps ] more anonymous. It seemed to me to make it a little more dignified”.
However, PRWORA’s main concern was the fulfillment of Clinton’s campaign pledge to “end welfare as we know it.” Welfare was no longer a right but a life-altering one. It was thought to be an effort to reduce recipients ‘ reliance on the welfare system and make them work.
Urminska recalls her mother’s concern about the changes. She had her own small consultancy, working as an art preservationist, and three children. She needed food stamps to keep a balance between her family’s needs and her work.
They wanted her to work as a grocery clerk, and that would have stifled the entire family,” Urminska said.
Modernizing SNAP
An increase in SNAP usage is typically a financial indicator of difficult times. When COVID-19 hit and people lost their jobs,  , Harrell , began distributing free food. Even as the pandemic has abated, TCRC serves 10, 000 people per month, and if he could rescue more food, he could help more people.
” People’s food stamps run out before the end of the month” , , Harrell , explained. That’s when they turn to food pantries. Harrell, who authored the article, said he thinks SNAP users should receive two payments each month rather than a one-monthly lump sum to address this issue.
Urminska said she believes that granting those in need of money to spend as they see fit would help remove terrifying bureaucratic barriers like those that frustrated her mother.
There are also concerns that SNAP regulations, which still have restrictions like a ban on hot prepared foods, have lost touch with the realities of living in a family.
As a recent editorial from , Harvard Public Health , noted,” The program still reflects 1960s-era assumptions that mom is at home cooking from scratch, not rushing from work to cobble dinner together. That$ 4.99 , Costco , rotisserie chicken is a lifesaver for working parents.  , Congress , must update SNAP to the realities of life in 2024″.
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