Connecticut officials are bracing for a key federal nutrition assistance program to stop abruptly in 10 days, absent intervention from President Trump’s administration or an end to the federal government shutdown.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture sent states a memo on Oct. 10 warning “there will be insufficient funds to pay full November … benefits” in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, commonly known as SNAP.
But rather than directing states to issue partial benefits, the department directed them, effectively, to shut down the Electronic Benefit Transfer or EBT cards that SNAP recipients use to purchase groceries.
That means these cards won’t gain any new purchasing power starting Nov. 1, and any unused benefits also can’t be accessed after Oct. 31 — and state legislators’ hopes that Connecticut could provide funding to continue the program have likely been dashed.
“If the federal shutdown keeps going, SNAP benefits for November will not be sent out,” Connecticut Social Services Commissioner Andrea Barton Reeves wrote Tuesday in a memo to state legislators and nonprofit community action agencies.
“November federal SNAP benefits cannot be issued until the federal government shutdown ends or new guidance is provided by FNS,” Reeves added, referring to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food and Nutrition Service.
Connecticut distributes about $75 million per month in federal SNAP benefits, with many households receiving about $190, the commissioner told the legislature’s Appropriations Committee earlier this month.
SNAP serves an estimated 360,000 people in Connecticut per year, according to state officials. But many households come on and drop off food assistance multiple times annually. The number of instances in which Connecticut residents are enrolled each year exceeds 500,000.
CT’s options to respond to SNAP freeze are limited
Reeves and Gov. Ned Lamont identified SNAP when the federal government shutdown began on Oct. 1 as a program that could quickly fall into jeopardy.
“Like many other states across the country, we are working with our federal partners to understand the full impacts of the federal government shutdown to the SNAP program for the 360,000 individuals in our state who rely on this critical federal program to feed themselves and their families,” state Department of Social Services spokesman Christine Stuart said on Wednesday. “We’ve notified our residents and community partners that November SNAP benefits will not be available until the federal government reopens. We will not let anyone go hungry because Congress can’t reach an agreement. Our hope is that Washington recognizes the real consequences this has on families in Connecticut and across the country and ends this shutdown.”
A federal program administered in cooperation with states, SNAP has a complicated funding structure. Washington and the states share administrative expenses, but the cost of benefits traditionally has been borne chiefly by the federal government. Connecticut used to offer complimentary state-funded food assistance benefits, but that ended in the late 2000s.
Shortly after the latest shutdown began, some Connecticut legislators asked if the state — which has enjoyed unprecedented budget surpluses averaging more than $1.8 billion since 2017 — could again pump some of its own resources into SNAP benefits.
But with the Trump administration’s latest directive effectively shutting down EBT cards Nov. 1, that is problematic at best, said state Sen. Cathy Osten, D-Sprague, co-chairwoman of the Appropriations Committee.
Osten, whose panel met with state social services officials last week, added that creating a new network to distribute state-funded food assistance benefits could take up to six months.
Both Lamont and state legislative leaders have said they are exploring options to expand emergency aid to food pantries and banks and other nonprofit nutrition assistance services.
“That’s the only way we’re going to get food to people,” Osten said, adding she fears this would cover only a modest fraction of the need created by an indefinite halt to SNAP benefits. “It’s bad right now. It’s really, really bad.”
How food pantries could address growing demand
If SNAP funding dries up next month, that will put increasing pressure on local food pantries to fill the need, particularly for low-income individuals and families who rely on aid to purchase groceries.
Connecticut Foodshare has been in daily talks with state officials about how the state might step in with nutrition assistance at risk.
The group works with more than 600 food pantries across the state as well as 110 mobile sites that are operated by Foodshare. Jason Jakubowski, the president and CEO, said about 85% of pantries in Connecticut are affiliated with them, and they provide the majority of the food to their partners, though they also source from other entities.
“At this point, we’re trying to figure out if the state is able to provide funding for local pantries who are going to see their lines double or even triple over the next couple of weeks,” Jakubowski said. “My sense is let’s see what happens next Saturday with the SNAP benefits.”
Foodshare officials are thinking about their next steps in 30-day increments. For October, the nonprofit worked on food distributions for federal employees in Connecticut who were still working and not getting paid, like TSA agents. They were able to do this with the help of $1 million in emergency funding authorized by its board of directors.
With Nov. 1 approaching, Jakubowski said the focus is on the existing network of pantries and ensuring they have enough food to meet the increased demand. But if the shutdown drags on beyond that, Jakubowski said, they’ll need to seriously consider setting up emergency food distribution sites for the month of December — similar to what they did during the pandemic.
They would need money from the state to make it happen, since a lot goes into running one. He said it would take anywhere from a week to a week and a half to ramp up such operations like food purchasing, the trucks, traffic control and the parking lots for distribution.
He estimated it would cost about $10 million to operate one emergency distribution each weekday for a month. During COVID, Foodshare launched sites in different corners of the state everyday. They were largely running them out of state and municipally owned parking lots, including the University of Connecticut’s stadium in East Hartford.
“It’s a pricey option. We do have the template because we did it five years ago,” Jakubowski said. “We’re not jumping into the deep end with this.”
State officials and local pantries are in a holding pattern as they await more guidance or the possibility of the federal government moving around money to keep SNAP afloat. But Jakubowski feels hopeful that Connecticut is much better positioned than other states if SNAP goes away in November.
“A lot of other … state governments are just shrugging their shoulders and saying, ‘hey, yeah, sorry, there’s nothing we can do.’ The conversation here in Connecticut is not ‘should we be doing anything,’ it’s ‘what can we do,'” he said.
The 600 pantries that work with Foodshare have already seen an uptick in demand, with lines resembling the peak of the pandemic at times. And that has only grown during the first few weeks of the government shutdown, which is so far the second-longest in U.S. history.
The Connecticut State Colleges and Universities system, which operates food pantries at the four regional state universities and at most community college campuses, recently reported a 40% increase in demand.
A 2024 survey at Central Connecticut State University found 55% of students could not afford to eat balanced meals, and 27% of students went at least one day a week without eating because of financial challenges.
CSCU officials announced this week that the Stop & Shop grocery store chain had donated $200,000 in goods and services to support the system’s pantries.
Connecticut Voices for Children, a New Haven-based policy group advocating for use of more state resources to temper federal cutbacks in SNAP and other human service programs, urged state officials to seek more solutions.
“In one of the wealthiest states in the country, we have the resources to ensure that no one goes hungry,” said Emily Byrne, executive director of Connecticut Voices for Children. “We aren’t going to food-bank our way out of this problem. We cannot logistically send a half a million people to food banks. Doing this is akin to creating bread lines at the state’s own hand. Connecticut is better than this.”
The Connecticut Mirror/Connecticut Public Radio federal policy reporter position is made possible, in part, by funding from the Robert and Margaret Patricelli Family Foundation.
This story was originally published by the Connecticut Mirror.
