More in Mass. turn to food stamps, get less

Jin-ah Kim

It’s never been easy feeding a family with food stamps, but in these difficult economic times, it’s about to become harder.

As food prices continue to increase and the value of food stamps remain the same, local community food groups are bracing themselves for what they expect to be a very difficult year.

The Greater Boston Food Bank is one of them. The charitable organization distributes about 30 million pounds of food each year to more than 600 community agencies in eastern Massachusetts. The organization recently announced a huge jump in prices based on their food purchase for fiscal year 2009.

According to the food bank’s most recent report, eggs were 44 percent more expensive this year than last, while the price of canned tuna showed a 42 percent increase.

As a result, the food bank raised its funding goals for this year. Though it reached its increased target, food bank spokesperson Stacy Wong said there are still potential shortfalls.

“Especially in fall and winter, that’s when people start heating their homes,” she said. “And they are already trying to balance food costs and higher fuel costs.”

Part of the problem is how the federal government calculates inflation for the monthly food stamp benefit, or the amount of aid that families in the program receive each month.

Before 1996, the benefit covered 103 percent of food costs. But that year, Congress changed the way that inflation adjustments were made, as part of cost-saving measures. Since then, the benefits have been calculated based on food prices that are often out of date.

For instance, in the 12-month period that ended in June 2008, food prices increased by 8.5 percent, according to Colleen Pawling, a food stamp analyst with the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP), a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit research group. The food stamp benefit will be adjusted in October to reflect inflation based on the cost numbers from June — data that is now four months old.

Worse, the benefit will then remain unchanged for another 12 months.

“Food costs keep going up,” said Pawling. “And the amount of benefit doesn’t go up. … [It’s] always behind. It’s never keeping up.”

The delay is now standard. But as food prices continue to soar, the lag time seems more problematic this year — and could affect more people.

As it is now, the number of low-income Massachusetts residents receiving a monthly allotment of food stamps has doubled over the last eight years to 456,192, according to the CBPP — roughly 7 percent of the Commonwealth’s population.

Among the fastest growing segments of the state’s population applying for food stamps: senior citizens. Since February 2007, the number of seniors using food stamps has jumped by 39 percent, to more than 69,000.

Created during the administration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, America’s first food stamp program ran from 1939 to 1943. After an 18-year hiatus, a new pilot program was launched in 1961, and food stamps have existed in the U.S. in one form or another ever since, providing a nationwide resource in the fight against hunger for many low-income families.

Most stamps distributed by the program — officially renamed the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP— go to households with children, elderly members or people with disabilities, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA).

Administered by the state Department of Transitional Assistance, Massachusetts’ food stamp program participants use Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) cards — similar to debit or ATM cards — to purchase any food product (except alcohol, pet foods or pre-cooked foods) at most grocery stores, convenience stores and food markets.

Patricia Baker of the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute, a nonprofit that advocates for low-income state residents, says food stamps alone won’t solve the growing problem.

“We are going to run into a major food and fuel crisis this winter,” said Baker. “Even if we leverage the maximum [amount of] food stamps from the federal government, it’s not going to be enough to address the hunger issue in Boston. The state should step up.”