Errors deny thousands assistance
BOISE – Thousands of people entitled to food stamps were denied assistance because of errors made by state workers in processing the applications, legislative auditors said.
The report made public Wednesday estimated from mid-2002 to mid-2003 alone, more than 13,000 Idaho residents did not receive government food assistance due them. The error rate, blamed by some on overworked employees, also could cost the state as much as $1 million in penalties from the federal government.
Since 2001, when the economy began its slide, the number of food stamp recipients has almost doubled to nearly 100,000 a month. During the same time, staffing to handle the program was slashed 21 percent – 60 people – as the state coped with its own version of the budget crisis that gripped households throughout Idaho.
Last fall, then-Deputy Health and Welfare Director Joyce McRoberts tried to convince lawmakers before she retired that they’d created a crisis by cutting staff at a time when food stamp applications were running at record levels. Lawmakers wound up restoring five of those eliminated jobs beginning next month.
Health and Welfare Department officials said they reviewed the program a year ago, identified problems and have taken a number of steps to bring the error rate down, ranging from more intense scrutiny of error-prone applications to simpler reporting requirements for families already receiving food stamps.
As of July 2003, the auditors found that 15.4 percent of food stamp applications were erroneously processed and that two-thirds of those involved denying applicants benefits they deserved. While some mistakes are expected in a program that costs up to $80 million a year, the federal government set the acceptable error rate for Idaho at 6.6 percent last year.
Spokesman Ross Mason said the rate has been dropping in the last several months, although it remains above the federal guidelines.
The auditors recommended food stamp managers assess programs in other states with substantially lower error rates and that lawmakers give the department authority to garnish unemployment benefits to recover overpayment of food stamps. There were nearly $2 million in overpayments uncollected during the audit period.
A legislative panel will also investigate the $1 billion Health and Welfare Department budget in an attempt to develop a better understanding of its complexities.
Idaho Foodbank Director Roger Simon declined to criticize the state but conceded that problems in the food stamp program only increase pressure on the rest of the state’s social safety net. His organization disburses 4.5 million pounds of food a year through 200 local agencies around the state.
“And we have not been able to keep up with the demand,” Simon said. “What that has meant is that the amount of food that the pantries have been able to give out is not at a level to get people through.”