Disgust, too, because of low expectations placed upon D.C.’s Department of Human Services, which administers SNAP. For instance, the USDA considers 6 percent to be an acceptable error rate in processing SNAP benefits. In 20 percent of cases, USDA data shows D.C. overpaid or underpaid benefits to SNAP recipients. Confronted with that finding in a D.C. Council hearing Tuesday, Wayne Turnage, deputy mayor for health and human services, said: “That means 80 percent of [cases] are not in error. So the system is not tremendously flawed.” In better-performing jurisdictions, that rationale sounds as though it might be a firing offense.
No doubt Human Services experienced sharp demand for food assistance benefits during the pandemic — a 40 percent increase, Laura Zeilinger, the department’s director, said during the same public hearing. She also acknowledged that as of 2022, D.C. had the slowest processing rate for SNAP benefits in the nation. Think about that for a moment: The pandemic didn’t strike D.C. alone. States took the blows, too, and most responded to the demands in a timely or at least an acceptable fashion. Why is the District among the worst in the nation?
“We know that we’re still not where we would like to be,” Zeilinger said, stating the obvious. “We have first and foremost made our priority on improving our timeliness — we know the importance that people need their benefits as soon as possible.” Fancy words? Yes. With results to show? None that you would notice.
Turnage went one step further, saying he thought the city was doing “fairly well” at helping people in need, given how many it serves, including SNAP beneficiaries, participants in the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program and about 300,000 Medicaid enrollees. “Half the city,” Turnage stressed.
Little was disclosed during the hearing about how exactly Turnage and Zeilinger expect to fix the problem. Here it is, the second year in a row the city has had a far from acceptable error rate, and Turnage testified that administrators are focused on trying to identify whether prevalent errors are problems with the computer system or with staffers. Duh? If program leaders don’t know by now …
Added Turnage, “And when we do that, we make good progress toward fixing it,” noting that solutions may entail either enhancing technology or better training case workers. Any wonder why the taxpaying public might cry?
Council member Robert C. White Jr. (D-At Large), who jointly held Tuesday’s hearing with council member Christina Henderson (I-At Large) — both of whom are seeking reelection — demanded that Mayor Muriel E. Bowser’s human resources team produce a document laying out the causes of SNAP errors, including the data and metrics officials are using to identify and solve the problems, by month’s end. “I don’t want to let them skate on this,” he told The Post.
Pray tell, what have they been doing these past two years? Apparently, they’ve been earning a $4.4 million federal penalty. Will the council hold city leaders accountable? Or will it bluff, bluster and dither, letting them skate on and leaving families without food on the table?
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