OKLAHOMA CITY – Gov. Kevin Stitt and Republican leaders in the state Senate and House of Representatives voted unanimously Nov. 3 to provide $7.8 million to food banks to help impoverished Oklahomans in all 77 counties now that federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program funds have been cut.
Stitt, Senate Pro Tempore Lonnie Paxton, R-Tuttle, and House Speaker Kyle Hilbert, R-Bristow, are three members of the Contingency Review Board. The board held an emergency meeting at the state Capitol to allocate the emergency funds.
The action by the board will earmark state funds to support vulnerable elderly, disabled and child SNAP recipients while the federal program remains disrupted. The funds will be distributed through state food banks.
Paxton said lawmakers needed to do something but acknowledged the emergency fund allocation was a small fix to a much bigger issue.
“This is just kind of a Band-Aid on a huge problem,” he said. “If we actually tried to replenish EBT cards in state it would be like $130 million per month. It’s a federally created problem that we’re trying not to use state funds to fix.”
In addition to the emergency funding, Paxton said the board spent more than $70,000 to upgrade the software used by the benefit cards. The upgrade will allow the cards to receive state funds in addition to federal money in the future if that need arose.
“If this problem becomes a bigger crisis for hunger in the state, then we would be able to fund the cards,” he said. “Though those funds – which could be as high at $130 million per month – would have to come from the Rainy Day fund.”
Paxton said lawmakers wanted to upgrade the cards just in case.
“It takes two or three weeks to upgrade those cards,” he said. “But we wanted to go ahead and start the process, thinking we’d probably never need to make a state allocation. But if we did have to, we wouldn’t have to wait another two or three weeks. The cards would be ready to go.”
Democrats praised the effort but added that more work needed to be done.
“We appreciate the targeted emergency support being voted on by Oklahoma Republican leaders, but we know that it is still not enough,” House Minority Leader Cyndi Munson, D-Oklahoma City, said in a media statement. “It is unfortunate that it took so long for those in the highest positions of power in Oklahoma to act on behalf of hungry Oklahomans.”
Munson said Democrats would continue a push to use Rainy Day funds for food banks and want legislative leaders to consider other solutions.
“One solution would be creating a state-funded emergency SNAP benefits program to put money on EBT cards like we have seen other states do,” she said. “It may be a complicated process, but when Oklahomans are in need, they deserve every effort from those who serve them. We stand ready to work together on furthering efforts to support Oklahomans who rely on SNAP benefits and other programs that are affected by the federal shutdown.”
Joe Dorman, the executive director of the Oklahoma Institute for Child Advocacy, said he applauded the action by the Contingency Review Board but, like Munson, said that much more must be done. Dorman said officials should be concerned about the welfare of SNAP recipients and those federal and state employees who have been furloughed.
“It’s not just SNAP,” he said. “We have state and federal employees who were furloughed who are going without a paycheck. If they are like most Americans, they probably don’t have a savings account. And if they have a credit card that’s not maxed out, they are facing more debt just to get through this.”
Last week, the state Department of Human Services announced it was furloughing 2,300 employees because of the federal shutdown.
SNAP lost its funding after the Trump administration said it wouldn’t use a $5.5 billion contingency fund to pay for the benefit.
Last Friday, a federal judge in Rhode Island ordered the administration to release backup funds. That ruling followed one made the same day by a federal judge in Massachusetts who told government officials to decide by Monday whether they would use the contingency funds for food aid.
More than 680,000 Oklahoma residents – more than 15% of state residents – receive SNAP benefits. Nationwide, SNAP costs about $9 billion per month. However, since the month-long federal shutdown has continued, Congress has not allocated new funds for the program.
Still, Paxton said he was hopeful the federal shutdown would end soon but added he would be prepared if the shutdown continued.
“We’re aware that the $7.8 million is just a Band-Aid, he said. “There are 1000 scenarios we could go through, but I do believe this will end soon.”