Expanded access to food stamps, health care becomes law in Alaska

More Alaskans will be eligible for food stamps and access to health care for school-age children and young adults will increase under a bill that became law without Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s signature on Aug. 30.

Dunleavy sponsored the original bill, whose goal was to expand the services covered by Medicaid to include things like workforce development and food security. The bill takes advantage of a a federal waiver that allows states to consider the underlying causes of ill health. It was amended to include a proposal from Rep. Genevieve Mina, D-Anchorage, and Sen. Cathy Giessel, R-Anchorage, aimed at increasing SNAP access after the state’s Department of Health failed to process thousands of applications within the legal timeline in a backlog that left thousands of Alaskans without food aid for months at a time. Over the last two years, Dunleavy’s administration has added more than $70 million to state budgets to fight the crisis.

The state Senate passed the final version of House Bill 344 by a unanimous vote and the bill passed the Alaska House of Representatives by a vote of 26-14 on the final day of the 2024 legislative session.

“This bill is such a good deal for the thousands of Alaskans that have been trying to tread the uncertainty of food security,” Mina said on Tuesday. “We’ve been dealing with this issue for the past three years in terms of the inefficiencies of the SNAP program. And it’s just so exciting to think that moving ahead, we’re putting this path for a better-staffed program where working families can get the food that they need and also that they have a better path to sustainability.”

With the law’s passage, Alaska became the 43rd state to expand access to federal food assistance. The law will increase the income threshold for food stamp applicants and allow them to have savings while using the program when it takes effect on July 1, 2025. Currently, SNAP participants may have only limited savings and may be no more than 30% above the federal poverty level. Next summer, there will be no cut off for the amount of savings or assets SNAP participants have and the income threshold will be twice the federal poverty level.

“The SNAP program is a crucial tool for low-income households, but the income threshold was too low. As a result, people in need were going hungry, or, in some cases, people were forced to turn down a better paying job because the pay difference was not enough to make up for the lost food benefits. This is a good bill that strengthens the food and healthcare safety net in Alaska and I’m excited to see it become law,” said Giessel in a news release.

Mina said this adjustment means that Alaskans on the edge of those limits will not automatically lose SNAP benefits when they get a pay increase or save their money, which is called a “benefits cliff.”

“The problem is that, for folks who are stuck in a cycle of poverty, if you can’t save up money or if you can’t save up for an emergency fund, then you’re stuck in a financially stressful and precarious foundation,” Mina said.

The new law doesn’t eliminate the benefits cliff entirely, Mina said, but it does reduce its severity with a graduated, step-down program as beneficiaries’ incomes increase — more of a hill than a cliff.

She said Alaskans continue to call her office because they have waited too long for food stamps, but that the number is going down. She said it is evidence that policy changes are working.

The new law also allows the state to be reimbursed by the federal government for health care services for students who are eligible for Medicaid. Sen. Löki Tobin, D-Anchorage made an amendment to the bill that increased Medicaid eligibility.

“Providing healthcare to more people is a good thing, which is exactly what this bill does. The students that will be helped are already eligible for Medicaid. HB 344 simply allows healthcare services to be given to students in a more convenient location, which is often their school,” said Tobin in her newsletter on Tuesday.

The law goes into effect on Oct. 28, but the availability of the Medicaid coverage is likely to depend on how quickly districts can adapt their billing, Tobin said.

Originally published by the Alaska Beacon, an independent, nonpartisan news organization that covers Alaska state government.