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When I learned that the Braun administration recently refused to follow through with its intent to apply for more than $70 million in federal Sun Bucks, or Summer Electronic Benefits Transfer funding, I was pretty incensed. When I received the email from my son’s school about Sun Bucks being discontinued, I was even more incensed.
As a human needs and consumer advocate, I was immediately worried for Indiana families that are already struggling to pay the bills—especially the one in four kids who don’t know where their next meal will come from. I was immediately worried because there’s simply no way the nonprofit sector can address this by itself. Families facing hunger will now face an even bleaker summer without Sun Bucks benefits designed to cover the expense of food that children would normally consume while at school.
With all the fraud, waste and abuse theatrics from our elected officials lately, I thought it would be helpful to point out that we’re not talking astronomical sums of money for each child. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Sun Bucks provides a mere $120 in grocery benefits per eligible school-age child when school is out for summer. But it’s a critical $120 for a family that suddenly has more mouths to feed than during the school year.
Sadly, the narrative out of the Family and Social Services Administration has been pretty loose with the facts and long on the rhetoric. The agency claims that the necessary notice of intent wasn’t submitted to the USDA by the required Feb. 15 deadline.
So the question remains: Was this deadline missed intentionally? And if so, why?
Make Indiana Healthy Again? This has to be a joke. The Sun Bucks decision will make Indiana hungrier and force our poorest Hoosiers to go without meals—an excruciatingly heartless decision, and that’s before considering the mess of changes to federal nutrition programs that sits in the U.S. Senate currently that will systematically
starve Hoosiers.
I don’t buy the excuse that Braun “inherited a mess” at FSSA. Notwithstanding, it is no excuse for exacerbating problems in the very agency that oversees programs ensuring basic human service for Hoosiers. While FSSA had more than its share of poor decision-making throughout the Holcomb administration—namely Medicaid unwinding, PathWays to Aging and waiver transition disasters that could have been better communicated and managed—there is no justification for simply choosing to mess with Hoosiers’ welfare. In fact, it’s a moral failure upon which Braun’s signature is etched indelibly.
With lines at pantries like Mid-North Food Pantry getting longer day after day, we Hoosiers have work to do. And it will be up to each of us—Democrats, Republicans and independents—to gather up the courage to do better by our hungry neighbors.
Like the turbid and tragic drama “Turn of the Screw” (a must-read), it begs the question, “If a child gives the effect another turn of the screw, what do you say to two children—?”
Apparently, “Let them eat cake” is the answer. Are SNAP recipients still allowed to buy that, Gov. Braun?•
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Haake is a government affairs and public relations strategist at Onward & Upward Strategies. Send comments to [email protected].
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Question about this program–how are the funds delivered to the families? Are they already receicing SNAP benefits and the money is added to their card? Just curious. Thank you!