Mercedes Bristol, the executive director of Non-profit Texas, spent a day at her San Antonio home sending emails, combing hair, answering phone calls, and doing laundry for her grandson.
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), commonly known as food stamps, will make Texans’ lives more secure. Bristol will undoubtedly gain from the aforementioned law. The bill will provide financial aid and other associated services to many Texans.
Here are the qualifications for Texas food stamps:
Even though it is a federal program, states have the power to decide in making different requirements for its people to qualify for SNAP. Qualifications for Texas food stamps include primarily household income and household cars, known as the vehicle asset test.
Bristol shared that when she got her five grandchildren, she went to file for Temporary Assistance for Needy Families. “I was denied because my car was over the income limit. I had no beds, no clothes, I had to run out and get two car seats,” Bristol added.
If you owned a vehicle valued at $15, 000 or more and had additional vehicles worth $4, 650 or more, you will not be qualified for the current SNAP policy in Texas which was set in 2001.
Thus, qualifications for Texas food stamps are not easy to access.
According to Feeding Texas, a nonprofit food bank network, more than 54,000 Texas SNAP applicants will be denied in 2022 due to the worth of their vehicles. However, eligibility for Texas food stamps will be expanded in September if a Texan’s primary car is worth less than $22,500 and any additional vehicles are worth less than $8,700.
Celia Cole, CEO of Feeding Texas, praised the improvement in eligibility qualifications for Texas food stamps but wants Texas to consider other factors so that Texans will maximize the benefits.
Qualifications for Texas food stamps will be challenging for Bristol because she now earns more than the program’s minimum. She also stated that many other grandparents will not.
Jennifer Washington, a mother of three, was recently refused SNAP benefits due to the monetary worth of her family’s automobiles. She is hopeful, though, that she will be alongside other Texans who will benefit from the program once the qualifications for Texas food stamps are developed.
The newly-improved qualifications for Texas food stamps are important to Washington since the food she receives sometimes is insufficient for her twins who happened to have food allergies.
She is now able to go to the grocery shop and buy food for her family. “This is a tool that will provide significant relief,” Washington said in an interview.