What is SNAP?
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program
What is SNAP?
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)—what used to be known as “food stamps”—provides a boost for families and individuals who are going through a tough financial period. Never has that been more true than now: since March close to 7 million more people nationwide have started to receive SNAP benefits. SNAP recipients are not the only ones who benefit: Moody’s Analytics estimates that every SNAP dollar generates $1.70 in economic activity.
The process is simple. SNAP users receive a card similar to a pre-paid credit card that they can use to shop at grocery stores and farmers markets for the food that is right for them and their families; the card is refilled every month until the benefits are no longer needed. Most of the families who receive SNAP are living at or below 200% or the federal poverty line–researchers estimate that in North Carolina SNAP benefits alone keep 300,000 families from falling into poverty as the extra help with food bills frees up family income to pay rent, utilities and medical bills.
In North Carolina, almost 63% of SNAP participants are in families with children and 29 percent are in households that include someone elderly or disabled. At the beginning of the pandemic, when schools closed, families whose children qualified for free or reduced lunch/breakfast also received extra “P-EBT” benefits to see them over the hump.
My daughter is autistic-nonverbal. We really didn’t have a lot of solutions for her, other than the typical therapies. And I came across an article that said putting them of a gluten-free diet would change a lot for them. So it turns out she actually had a gluten intolerance, as well. So this changed – literally – everything for our family. She’s about to turn 9. And at 8 years old, she still wasn’t potty-trained. And she’d really regressed a lot. But one month into the gluten-free diet, she started to be fully potty-trained. She started speaking more. A lot of that was due to the market. There are a lot of gluten-free vendors here. And I could get a ton of products. It was really, really helpful to our family.
I found an ad for the Corner Market and the SNAP doubling on one of my groups on Facebook, and I thought I would come try it out. And when I got here, I fell in love – not only with the products, but with the people. The people make me feel so welcome, and we see the same faces every week. People really get to know you, and not the fact that you’re just “some money.” And they really try to bring in anything they can to try to help you.
The ability to double SNAP/EBT at the Corner Market is incredible. Especially because our EBT normally runs out, on a gluten-free diet. Just one trip to the store could cost upwards of $100 just for my daughter’s stuff. On top of that, there’s always stuff that’s missing. And she’s very consistent with what she wants, and they’re not the cheapest things. So Green4Greens has literally saved us for months over.
– Corner Market customer
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