ATLANTA — Families across Georgia are once again turning to 11Alive for help as tens of thousands of people still are not receiving their SNAP benefits on time.
The backlog has been an issue impacting families on and off for a year now as Georgia Department of Human Services struggles to process cases within federal guidelines.
Koren Gibbs, among those who sought in-person help this week, after seeing her SNAP benefit case marked as 'approved' in the state's online portal, found the funds for which she's eligible for are still pending. Her four-month-old baby boy was with her as she stood in line to speak with a specialist.
"I just waited in line for two hours for them to give me my caseworker's number and say that they're backed up," Gibbs said.
She indicated her next stop of the day would be a food pantry. A call to the number provided went to voicemail, she said, with the voice mailbox full.
Gibbs said she's never had an issue renewing benefits in the past. Normally, she trusts the process with her funds arriving on the date indicated.
"I'm so glad I called before I went to the store because I would have had a cartful of food and no way to pay for it," Gibbs said.
Across Georgia, other families have reached out to 11Alive with their stories, some writing:
- “I’m disabled and on Medicaid, needing help with this program.”
- “This has been a complete tragedy for me and my children. My renewal was for Sept 15, 2023. I completed my renewal application Sept 12, 2023 with all my verifications.”
- “For the past two weeks I’ve had to wake up to ‘mommy, I’m hungry.’ Or ‘mommy, we don’t have any food.’”
- “Food banks are not within reach or walking distance for me.”
- “I did my renewal as soon as it was available for me to do to try and avoid this, but it still happened.”
- “I've tried calling my caseworker, her supervisor, and the supervisors supervisor. I've talked to absolutely no one.”
Local crossing guard Mashan Burkett is among those trying to reach a caseworker to her case processed.
"They hardly answer their phones, and then they tell you to call the supervisor," Burkett said. "What good is that when the supervisor don't answer?"
11Alive has been investigating the delays in assistance for a year now, with the state's effort to deal with the backlog ongoing. As of Oct. 16, more than 119,000 SNAP renewals are pending, 36,915 which are overdue beyond the 30-day processing federal law requires, per data provided by the state.
A spokesperson for Georgia Department of Human Services said the department continues to prioritize oldest renewals first as well as offer overtime as hiring continues.
"We are also offering stipends to incentivize field leadership staff to carry a caseload,' the spokesperson responded. "Since January, we have hired 923 new Economic Support Specialist 1 workers – and secured millions in new funding through legislative advocacy to make that possible."
But a caseworker 11Alive spoke with on background, due to fears for her job, said staff turnover continues to be a stress. Caseworkers are also dealing with an uptick in new applications, she said, in addition to the renewal backlog.
The summer had shown some promise. DHS numbers presented during an Aug. 30 DFCS State Advisory Board Meeting showed an improvement in recent months in frontline staffing and caseload levels, with the average caseload in July being 981, compared to more than 1,100 in April.
However, when 11Alive asked DHS for updated caseload numbers, a spokesperson provided August data showing comparable workloads, yet has not answered our request for October data.
The delayed SNAP benefits meanwhile can mean a ripple effect when it comes to other aspects of child welfare and parental stress, Melissa Carter, executive director of the Barton Child Law and Policy Center at Emory Law School, explained.
"We know that when those benefits are interrupted or when they're delayed and certainly when there are extended delays to accessing those benefits, the parents are having to make choices about paying other bills or securing food for children," Carter said. "Tradeoff's like accessing timely and adequate health care, for example, or paying rent, and those issues of healthcare, of housing instability are also issues of basic needs of children and also give rise to concerns and reports about neglect."
Carter acknowledged that such benefits programs can be complicated to administer but emphasized the state has a duty to care for the most vulnerable.
"To be clear, I don't think that this is a failure of our DFCS economic support specialists who are really doing their best under what can seem like and feel like, I think, daily unmanageable circumstances in their jobs," Carter said. "At some point, we need to call this a real failure of government to perform some of its basic functions for those most in need and to create working conditions for those for the workforce."
"People are hungry, and they need to provide for themselves and for their children," Carter added. "Government has a role for people who are eligible in making sure that that happens. And so we just need to be doing that."
GA DHS continues to hire economic support specialists. More information on open positions can be found here.
For families seeking emergency food assistance, 'Find Help Georgia' may be a resource. Learn more at FindHelpGA.org to search for help by zip code or speak to a specialist.
11Alive viewers who want to speak with a reporter about the delays can email the newsroom.