USDA warns Maine that food stamps won’t be issued in November

By Christopher Burns, Bangor Daily News Staff

Food stamps won’t be issued in Maine, or any other state, starting next month.

That’s the warning from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to the Maine Department of Health and Human Services and other state agencies as the federal government shutdown drags into its fourth week with no end in sight.

Nearly 170,000 Mainers rely on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, more commonly referred to as food stamps, to keep their cupboards stocked, according to Lindsay Hammes, a spokesperson for Maine DHHS.

Three-quarters of Maine households that receive the benefit include at least one working adult, more than a third include a person with a disability, 43% include an older adult and more than a third include children, Hammes said Tuesday morning.

In four Maine counties — Androscoggin, Aroostook, Piscataquis, Somerset and Washington — about a fifth of their residents rely on the anti-hunger program.

The average benefit for a Maine family of four is $572.

“The federal SNAP program helps support food security, improve health outcomes, and strengthen Maine’s economy,” the state’s health commissioner, Sara Gagné-Holmes, said in a statement. “For tens of thousands of Maine people, these benefits mean the ability to put food on the table. A disruption of this scale will also impact Maine’s food pantries, which are vital partners in helping communities meet basic needs, as well as retailers. We are monitoring developments closely and will continue to assess the full impact.”

Gov. Janet Mills, a Democrat, cast blame on Republicans and the Trump administration, saying they have “shut down the government instead of agreeing to extend the health care tax credits on which so many families depend to pay for their health insurance.” The fate of Affordable Care Act tax credits, set to expire this year, has been a major sticking point in the stalemate over reopening the government.

“They should listen to the people of this country and stop cutting health care, stop hurting working families, and end this needless shutdown,” Mills said in a statement.

This move won’t affect benefits already loaded onto an EBT card but not used before November. Maine DHHS will continue to accept and process applications, renewals and other updates during the shutdown.

The agency noted that this change affects food stamp recipients nationwide and cannot be appealed.