Phone calls to Kihayla Soloye have not yielded any responses.
Health and Human Services Food Stamp Office in Round Rock. Submitted by Julie Karam to KXAN.
Health and Human Services Food Stamp Office in Round Rock.
She drove to the Round Rock Health and Human Services Food Stamp Office on Tuesday morning after several weeks of waiting in the hopes of speaking with someone.
She had experienced delays in receiving what she considered a crucial benefit.
“Normally, the process takes one day, and they process it and get me some help right away, but they told me to wait 30 to 45 days, which made me think the lady had misspoken. “30 to 45 days?” I asked. And she replied, “Yeah,” Soloye elucidated.
Since May, she has attempted to renew her SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) food assistance.
Gas has been almost $5 lately, and I have a 3-year-old son, Soloye remarked. I’m DoorDashing to get groceries for my son and money for petrol.
“Today they were told by the clerk “we are 65 days behind you’ll simply have to wait,”” a KXAN News viewer who is assisting another family with their benefits application wrote in an email.
More applicants and a staffing shortage-
The SNAP program is controlled by the Texas Health and Human Services Commission.
SNAP food benefits are loaded onto a Lone Star Card, which can be used at any retailer that accepts SNAP like a credit card.
Approximately 258,000 applications were still pending processing as of June 26, according to Young, the agency’s assistant press officer.
To assure timely access to significant benefits, Young stated that HHSC was taking steps to process cases as rapidly as possible.
According to her, 74 per cent of applications are being decided within 30 days of submission, which is within the federal time limit.
Young cited the difficulty of a rise in applications and a staffing deficit.
Since several federal flexibilities expired in the past three months, which increased processing times, Young said, “the workforce and workload challenges throughout the pandemic have worsened.”
She clarified that among the federal flexibilities that were terminated were SNAP certification extensions.
Hiring at HHSC
A family of two may be eligible for a food benefit of around $459 per month. It costs $992 for a five-person family.
To aid with recruitment, HHSC has hosted job fairs.
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Just this month, the agency was given the go-ahead by the federal government to re-establish several federal flexibilities, including the suspension of the SNAP interview requirement and the extension of current re-certifications.
Families can get in touch with 2-1-1, the Texas Information and Referral Network (2-1-1 TIRN), Option 1, according to HHSC, to get a referral to the resources that are accessible. At the same time, they wait for their application to be processed.
To find out more about nearby food banks, families can also visit the organization’s community partner, Feeding Texas.
