State to send $4 million to food shelves

Gov. Tim Walz today announced $4 million in emergency state funding for Minnesota’s food shelves as the federal shutdown continues.

The new funding comes as a federal government shutdown threatens to end Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program grocery benefits on November 1.

the Faces of the state $73 million federal funding gap in the food safety net.

The funding will provide relief to 440,000 Minnesotans who receive SNAP benefits and grocery benefits from the Minnesota Family Investment Program, said Tiki Brown, commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Children, Youth and Families.

The state works with open door, To distribute core funding of about $5,000 to more than 300 food shelves and tribal nations statewide, Brown said.

“Then we will add additional funding when we look at the heat map… for SNAP participation and food shelf participation to help reallocate the remaining funds,” she said. This approach is “the quickest way to get money as soon as possible to Minnesotans who will be affected by this federal shutdown.”

The USDA told the state last week that any money used to continue November benefits would not be reimbursed by the federal government.

“I want to be very clear; the USDA, during this shutdown, has emergency funds that they can release just like the rest of us. They have chosen not to do so,” Walz said. He said 38 percent of SNAP recipients are children and 18 percent are seniors.

Governor Walz called the one-time funding a “bridge.”

“As this continues, it’s going to become a much bigger crisis. It might not seem like a crisis to some people, if you’re not relying on all these different services, but eventually it’s all going to start coming back home,” he added.