A ‘devastating’ financial ripple effect

After pregnancy caused one of May’s clients to temporarily leave her job as a server and bartender at A.W.Lin’s Asian Cuisine in Little Rock, she lost access to food stamps because income verification paperwork was sent to her old address. Christian Roberson said losing the monthly cushion was “devastating” and caused her family to become homeless because she and her husband fell three to four months behind on rent.

The mother of five said it felt “almost impossible” to get the benefits back. Roberson, 27, said she sent in all the required documents, but still wasn’t approved because the local Department of Human Services doesn’t “really give us enough time to turn anything in.”

In a statement to USA TODAY, the state DHS office said it is “required to provide benefits only to eligible clients, so it is necessary to make adjustments if a household has a change in income or repeated changes in income.”

“We do aim to make the process for applying or making changes to a SNAP case as efficient and seamless as possible,” Gavin Lesnick, chief of the office of communications and community engagement, said.

Last month, Roberson was issued EBT for the first time in 31⁄2 years and used the money to get fresh and frozen vegetables, whole milk, bacon, chicken and hamburger meat. Before, her kids could eat only soup, bread and crackers, she said, while she and her husband went without food.

“I usually didn’t eat,” Roberson said. “Me and my husband would literally starve ourselves just so our kids could.”

Contributing: Karen Weintraub, USA TODAY