Don’t support legislation that would push more people off social safety nets

Recently Kentucky legislators introduced House Bill 1, the latest attempt to make accessing vital public programs even more difficult for the Kentuckians who need them most. One provision of the bill would allow people accused of food stamp fraud to be permanently banned from all state-administered public benefit programs (including Medicaid). It would also expand work reporting requirements to qualify for benefit programs. Changes like this could have unintended consequences for a lot of families, including mine.

My family relies on the food stamp program (now called the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP). My husband is a full-time student at the University of Kentucky who supplements his income by teaching college courses and working part time jobs. I’m a full-time parent to our two young children. When the SNAP program is working as intended, it helps keep food on our table while we manage our other expenses.

However, two years ago the state of Kentucky deposited $6,000 into my family’s SNAP account, quite a leap from the $212 we receive on a monthly basis. When they discovered this error, they immediately halted our benefits and kicked us off Medicaid, threatening legal action and accusing us of “stealing” the funds. After fighting for answers for three months, we were finally notified that we had “paid our debt to the Commonwealth” (the state removed the balance they had put there to begin with) but would continue to remain under strict surveillance, needing to recertify every three months (instead of annually).

Last fall I had the opportunity to testify before a legislative task force about our experience. The stated goal of the taskforce was to better understand existing barriers to receiving benefits and to further investigate “fraudulent use” of public programs. Our legislators are extremely concerned with fraud, even though 99 percent of those using benefits do so legally, and those in our situation, where the state made the error, are treated criminally regardless. I also testified that the re-application process takes 4 to 6 weeks and 20 to 30 hours to complete each time due to the ever-changing documentation requirements and policies.

Since that time, unfortunately, such barriers and perceptions continue to impact our most vulnerable citizens who genuinely need these programs. House Bill 1 only further complicates the process. One must conclude that our legislators simply do not yet understand the challenges that exist or else they would take action.

With that in mind, I invite each of our legislators to walk with one of their constituents through the process of a SNAP, K-TAP, or Medicaid application, from start to finish. This shouldn’t be difficult, as in many of the sponsor’s districts, nearly half of the residents qualify for such benefits. Perhaps if our lawmakers exposed themselves to the everyday realities of their impoverished constituents, they would find it easier to empathize with our challenges, understand first-hand the impact of these legislative decisions, and finally be able to propose fair and lasting improvements to the system.

We must expect more from the men and women making policies that so intimately impact the lives of our families and neighbors. I urge my fellow Kentuckians to contact their state representatives and tell them to vote no on HB1. Tell them it’s time for real solutions. Tell them you expect them to stop wasting our time and actually get to work. Because for those of us struggling to pay bills, keep food on the table and life-saving medications in the cabinet, we don’t have time to waste.

Julianne Vantland is a writer and advocate who lives in Lexington with her family.