State to receive $3.4 million over three years, the lowest of 10 federal grants awarded
by Dave Ranney, KHI News Service
Topeka – Gov. Sam Brownback on Monday is expected to announce his administration’s participation in a federal grant program aimed at helping food stamp recipients find jobs and exit the program.
Joining the governor at a 10:30 a.m. news conference at the Department for Children and Families regional office in Topeka will be Audrey Rowe, head of the Food and Nutrition Service within the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which administers the nation’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), also known as food stamps.
USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack and U.S. Department of Labor Secretary Tom Perez on Friday announced that Kansas was one of 10 states chosen to participate in a $200 million grant program meant to find new ways to help SNAP beneficiaries find gainful employment.
The 10 states and their three-year grant amounts:
California, $12.2 million
Delaware, $18.8 million
Georgia, $15 million
Illinois $21.9 million.
Kansas, $3.4 million
Kentucky, $20 million
Mississippi, $20.5 million
Virginia, $22.3 million
Vermont, $9 million
Washington, $22 million.
Kansas’ grant is for the least amount of money, though two states, Vermont and Delaware, have less population. Thirty-five states applied for the grants.
Other states have indicated they will use their grants to develop online and on-the-job training programs, hire career counselors, and expand beneficiaries’ access to transportation, child care assistance and mental health services.
Theresa Freed, a DCF spokesperson, said Kansas’ grant plan will be announced Monday.
Only about one-fifth of the nation’s 48 million SNAP recipients are likely to benefit from job training. The rest are elderly, disabled, children, or already employed.
The grants are part of the five-year farm bill that Congress passed into law last year amid repeated calls for reining in SNAP spending, which costs $74 billion last year – twice what it cost in 2008.
Sen. Pat Roberts, Kansas, has been outspoken in his criticism of the federally-funded SNAP program.
In Kansas, SNAP spending in 2013 reached an all-time high: $471.6 million. Last year’s spending dropped to $415.8 million.
The average per-person SNAP benefit in Kansas is roughly $125 a month or $4.15 a day.
Of the 275,400 Kansans on food stamps In January, almost 132,000 – 45 percent — were children.
Generally, U.S. citizens are eligible for SNAP benefits if they are living in households at or below 130 percent of the federal poverty level, about $2,150 a month for a single parent with two children.
Shannon Cotsoradis, chief executive for the advocacy organization Kansas Action for Children, welcomed Kansas being awarded one of the grants.
“This opportunity couldn’t come at a better time,” Cotsoradis wrote in an email to KHI News Service. “As we continue to erode our social safety net in Kansas by making it more difficult for families with children to access and keep benefits that help them meet the most basic needs, this may provide a beacon of hope for our poorest families. We will be eager to learn more on Monday.”
Advocacy groups continue to be critical of the Brownback administration for reducing low-income families’ access to public assistance programs.
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