More in Mass. turn to food stamps, get less

To ease at least the red tape, state officials say they have tried to reach out to residents in need by changing asset requirements for recipients. They no longer need to submit their bank account, retirement account or property ownership information to be eligible for benefits.

While face-to-face interviews are still required for most people applying for the food stamp benefit, an online application has been available since last November to make the process more accessible to working families, the disabled and others who may have difficulties visiting state offices for interviews and paperwork.

But problems remain. On average, participating households here receive $0.96 per person per meal in food stamp benefits, an amount that analysts say is simply insufficient to prepare a nutritious meal, especially given ascending inflation this year.

Researchers from the Children’s Sentinel Nutrition Assessment Program (C-SNAP) at Boston Medical Center and Drexel University School of Public Health have studied the nutrition issue, reporting that skyrocketing food prices are a significant roadblock to food stamp users’ attempts to eat healthy.

According to a C-SNAP report released last month, even families in Boston receiving the maximum food stamp benefit would have to spend an additional $2,250 per year to purchase the Thrifty Food Plan, the standardized plan that the USDA uses as the basis for calculating food stamp benefits.

Mary Lynch, a pediatric nutritionist at Dorchester House Multi-Service Center, sees families struggle to put healthy food on the table — and the negative impact that a poor diet can have on a child.

“Every day I speak to people about how the food price is going up … It’s very difficult to feed your family, especially healthy food,” said Lynch. “Healthy foods are so expensive … I don’t think that food stamps are really ever enough.”

 Compounding the problem is increased demand at the hunger-relief agencies that the Greater Boston Food Bank supplies — food pantries, soup kitchens, homeless shelters and other major sources of food and help for low-income families. Wong cited potentially troubling findings in a recent survey of 25 agencies the food bank serves.

“Of the 25 agencies … 24 of them have seen the demand for food assistance go up,” said Wong. “More than half of them have run out of food at some point.”

That problem is common across the country.

“A lot of food pantries are really suffering,” said the CBPP’s Pawling. “They are just running out of food, and they are giving less to people.”

In a response to the growing concerns, the Boston Public Health Commission’s Boston Steps program has awarded $30,000 to local organizations working to improve access to affordable and healthy produce, primarily for city residents who receive food stamps or are participants in the federally-funded, state-run Women, Infants and Children (WIC) Nutrition Program.

Some of the grant funds have been awarded to Boston Bounty Bucks, an assistance program for food stamp users who shop at participating farmers’ markets in the city. Since August, the nonprofit Food Project has run the program, which enables food stamp users to double their benefits on EBT cards at the markets.

“For example, someone spends $5 with an EBT card, and we give them an additional $5, so they basically get $10 for produce,” said Cammy Watts, director of education and advocacy at the Food Project.

The participating farmers’ markets — located at North Harvard Street and Western Avenue in Allston, Boston Medical Center, Bowdoin Street Community Health Center, Dorchester House, ReVision Urban Farm Market, East Boston’s Central Square, 525 River Street in Mattapan, Brigham Circle in Mission Hill, Adams Park in Roslindale and Dudley Town Common in Roxbury — will be open until the end of October.

Watts said it was difficult to launch the program, due in part to technical issues with setting up wireless machines to take the EBT cards, but noted that it has started attracting more food stamp users of late.

“We had a huge turnout yesterday compared to other weeks,” Dorchester House’s Lynch said earlier this month. “Fifteen transactions for food stamps, which is pretty amazing for a small market.”

Material from the Associated Press was used in this report.

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