Children’s advocates in Louisiana are sounding the alarm amid the ongoing federal government shutdown. Susan East Nelson, the executive director of the Louisiana Partnership for Children and Families, says if the shutdown goes on much longer – and there’s no end in sight – some 800,000 SNAP recipients might not get their benefits come November 1st.
“We’ll probably be exhausted by the end of this month. And so, the November payments that normally would go out are not coming from the federal government and therefore, we have frozen them at the state level,” Nelson said.
Nelson says the timing of all this couldn’t be any worse.
“Right now, at the cusp of when people are trying to plan their Thanksgiving dinners and have people gathered in their homes for the holidays, and also the kids are going to be out of school for a week for those Thanksgiving holidays, so they won’t be getting those meals at school,” Nelson explained.
SNAP recipients make up almost 20% of Louisiana’s population. Nelson says if they don’t get those benefits on the first of the month, they will have to scramble just to put food on the table.
“That’s going to fall to community food pantries, food banks, churches, nonprofit organizations. Those kinds of entities are going to be required to step in and fill the gaps,” Nelson said.
Nelson says food pantries currently don’t even come close to having enough food for all SNAP recipients. She says for every meal they provide, SNAP provides about nine.
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