BOSTON — A new analysis by the Prison Policy Initiative (PPI) highlights the widespread restrictions states place on SNAP benefits for people who violate probation and how those policies indirectly discourage millions of people on probation from seeking food assistance.
In an article published on the PPI website, Aleks Kajstura wrote that “there is a legislative patchwork across the U.S. that prevents and deters people on probation from receiving vital federal food assistance, known as SNAP benefits.”
The analysis found that “39 states have some kind of probation violation-related disqualifications for SNAP benefits,” including states that “explicitly ban people with probation violations” and states that “discourage eligible people from applying by adding irrelevant questions about probation to their SNAP application.”
According to the study done by PPI, of the 39 states that have or threaten probation-related disqualifications, “21 states have a statutory disqualification for people on probation,” and 18 states do not, but still “ask about probation violations…even though the answer is irrelevant to eligibility.”
Specifically, PPI found that “the states with the highest rates of people on probation…either bar people with probation violations from accessing SNAP entirely or at least ask about probation violations on their application.”
The study found that “these variations in SNAP eligibility arose because the federal law that created the program disqualifies people with certain drug convictions from receiving benefits.” Kajstura writes that states have the option to opt out of this law and allow people to access SNAP despite having convictions.
These restrictions, although placed on people who have violated probation, also indirectly affect millions of people on probation.
According to the PPI study, “41.7 million people — nearly 1 in 8 Americans receive SNAP benefits.” In comparison, “the number of people on probation in the United States (2.9 million) is even bigger than the total number of people behind bars.”
Kajstura writes that SNAP applications “threaten harsh consequences for misrepresentations or mistakes,” so simply asking whether someone has violated probation “has a chilling effect on all people on probation, likely keeping people from applying even when they are eligible.”
People who are on probation also face the disadvantage of statistically earning less than the SNAP income eligibility cap ($22,352), where “over half of the people on probation earn under $20,000 per year,” Kajstura writes.
This limitation to SNAP benefits disproportionately affects women on probation since “70% of all women, and 81% of Black women…make less than $20,000 a year.”
With people on probation tending to be poor, it makes food security harder to obtain.
According to Kajstura, “Food security lowers crime rates and reduces recidivism, leading to improved public safety.” One of the goals of probation is to help people become successful, and having food security is helpful.
However, since those on probation are unable to or deterred from applying for SNAP benefits, PPI found that “twenty percent of formerly incarcerated people report suffering from food insecurity” and children of people on probation “are more likely to experience food insecurity than children of non-incarcerated parents.”
When basic needs are met and people have food security, it is “linked to increased neighborhood safety and social cohesion, and lower violent crime rates,” as well as “lower rates of recidivism,” according to the PPI analysis.
By allowing the formerly incarcerated to have access to nutrition assistance, they are less “vulnerable to food insecurity” that would otherwise “put them at risk of returning to illicit activity to meet their basic needs.”
Along with reducing crime, Kajstura writes that when people have access to basic needs, it “makes it easier for people to meet their probation requirements…and thus avoid incarceration for probation violations.”
It also “makes it easier to succeed at work or school,” and “having supplemental income for food helps people meet the financial obligations of probation.”
The analysis also mentions how advocates are “fighting for change” in Connecticut, which is one of the states that chose to “opt-out of the federal SNAP disqualifications for people convicted of drug offenses, but the state preserves a few carve-outs,” including the requirement that “people on probation be ‘satisfactorily serving’ their sentence in order to be eligible for SNAP benefits.”
While the application asks whether the applicant or anyone in their household has a probation or probation violation, it does not “provide any guidance on what constitutes a ‘probation violation,’” Kajstura states, “leading many people who are eligible for SNAP not to risk applying.”
According to PPI, Chicks Ahoy Farm in Connecticut is “focused on reforming probation to limit the impact of technical violations and ensure SNAP access.”
This includes changing “the current statutory language governing SNAP eligibility” and removing the word satisfactorily from “a person shall also be eligible for said benefits if such person is satisfactorily serving a sentence of a period of probation…”
Another option, according to Kajstura, is to follow Delaware’s footsteps and opt out “entirely of federal disqualifications linked to drug offenses.”
Finally, PPI recommends that “advocates be vigilant” because even if the law completely removes probation disqualifications, “the state may continue to ask the question on their forms.”
According to PPI, by allowing people “regardless of probation-related violations” to have access to SNAP, there will be improvement in “public safety” and “the lives of people on probation and their families.”
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