Congress created the P-EBT program early this year to help low-income parents buy food for their school-age children during coronavirus closures. Two high-ranking House Democrats said on Thursday the USDA would cut off benefits to students at schools that begin classes later than usual because of the pandemic.
The USDA sent “misleading” advice to state officials that indicates P-EBT will not be available during the interval between the traditional first day of school and a starting date that is delayed due to the coronavirus, said House Education chairman Bobby Scott of Virginia and Ohio Rep. Marcia Fudge, who chairs the House Agriculture nutrition subcommittee. “This is contrary to the statutory requirement” that gives P-EBT eligibility to students who qualify for free or reduced-price meals if school is closed for at least five days,” said the lawmakers.
“With as many as 17 million children not getting enough to eat this summer, it is critical for the department to do everything it can to ensure access to P-EBT,” wrote Scott and Fudge in a letter to Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue. The letter asked the USDA to clarify its guidance to states.
Meanwhile, fresh complaints arose about the $4 billion Farmers to Families Food Box program, the Trump administration’s signature response to hunger in America during the pandemic. Eric Cooper of the San Antonio Food Bank told NPR that the USDA had paid too much for food. “Some of these food boxes, they were $40, $50, $60 for what you’d get at a grocery store for about $20.” In addition, said NPR, many food banks said the private contractors running the program insisted on delivering to food bank warehouses, not to their distribution points, defeating the program’s “truck to (car) trunk” concept.
“Some of the program’s core promises have gone unmet,” reported The Counter. “That’s due at least in part to the fact that many of the companies awarded the lucrative contracts are ill-equipped to handle food in any real quantity. Food bank operators report having to pay the bill for delivery from their own budgets, receiving boxes that are leaking or falling apart, and that arrive full of commercial-grade bags of meat with no instructions for how to prepare it.” The Counter said public records indicate “the boxes have cost well above what USDA typically pays farmers and manufacturers for food it buys for food banks and schools.”
The USDA says the program, put together on short notice, creates a “win-win-win” by buying surplus fresh produce at the farm level, packaging it, and delivering boxes ready for distribution. Private contractors are paid to buy the food and find nonprofits to take delivery of it.