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Noon Edition

Trump Administration Wants To Reduce And Replace SNAP Benefits

Currently SNAP recipients receive money loaded onto an EBT card which they can use to buy food items that fall under USDA guidelines.

The Trump administration announced plans to overhaul the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps.

Under the proposal, low-income Americans who receive more than $90 a month through SNAP would receive half of their benefits in a "USDA Food Package." The plan would affect roughly 80 percent of SNAP recipients.

The packages would be delivered directly to recipients and could include items such as milk, juice, cereals, pasta, peanut butter, canned meat, and canned fruits and vegetables.

The USDA says state governments can deliver food at a lower cost than what SNAP recipients pay in retail stores — thus reducing the overall cost of SNAP by $129 billion over the next 10 years.

This week on Noon Edition, our panelists discussed how this proposal affects SNAP recipients.

Guests:

Julio Alonso: Executive Director of Hoosier Hills Food Bank, Bloomington, IN

Angela Babb: Visiting Assistant Professor, IU Department of Geography

Jessica Fraser: Director of Indiana Institute For Working Families, Indianapolis, IN

Susan Levin: Director of Nutrition Education, The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, Washington, D.C.

Conversation: Trump Administration Wants To Reduce And Replace SNAP Benefits

The current SNAP program operates by loading benefits onto an EBT card which can be used to redeem food items in participating retailers. There are roughly 42 million individuals using SNAP with an average benefit of $125.79 per month according to the USDA.

Julio Alonso is the executive director of the Hoosier Hills Food Bank. He says this food box program is severely limiting for low-income Americans.

"Some government bureaucrat is going to determine what you should get in a box of food every month as opposed to allowing you and your family to choose the items on the shelf of a grocery store that are best for your own needs," Alonso says.

Indiana has over 636, 500 SNAP beneficiaries as of November 2017. Indiana Institute for Working Families Director Jessica Fraser says she is skeptical that a food box program would make up for the additional proposed cuts to SNAP.

"They're trying to make it look like all the money from this cut is going to come from the savings that these boxes will provide, and I'm just not buying that that's the intention or that that's really reasonable."

Many callers of show shared concerns about SNAP recipients using benefits to purchase things like energy drinks or brand-name items.

Angela Babb is a visiting assistant professor in the Indiana University Department of Geography. She studies the Thrifty Food Plan which is the diet model that is used to calculate how much families receive.

Babb says criticizing the food choices of SNAP recipients stems from a compulsion to discipline the poor.

"I think it's important to know that food is more than calories in and calories out. Food is memory, food is culture, food is tradition," Babb says. "We treat the poor as though they're only supposed to think of food only as a number of calories and nutrients."

Susan Levin is the director of Nutrition Education for the Physicians Committe for Responsbile Medicine. She sees a silver lining in the proposal. She says a signal that the government is starting to think about applying better nutrition standards to SNAP.

"If I were to find a positive out of the proposal, it's that someone at the top is talking about health. Whether that's their motivation or not, they have brought up the concept of something healthier within SNAP," Levin says.

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