DENVER — When the federal government reopens, hundreds of thousands of Coloradans are wondering when SNAP benefits will go back to normal.
Denver7 touched base with Colorado's Department of Human Services (CDHS) and the governor's office. As of Wednesday morning, CDHS was in a holding pattern, working on giving out partial SNAP benefits, waiting to see what lawmakers decide about the spending bill.
In an e-mail a spokesperson for CDHS wrote:
"While this situation continues to evolve, the Colorado Department of Human Services (CDHS) and its technical partners have resumed processing under this new directive and are taking steps to issue payments onto SNAP recipients' Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) cards as rapidly as possible. If current guidance stays in place, these much needed partial SNAP funds will be available to more than 500,000 Coloradans this coming week."
What non-profits are clocking is how fast the state can move. When the state initially got the order to give out full benefits last Friday, they rolled it out to around 32,000 people that same day before they were told to pause by the United States Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court is now upholding a freeze on a ruling from a federal judge to pay full SNAP benefits until midnight Thursday.
The Trump administration said paying the benefits in full would require spending more money than is available in a contingency fund. Now the administration is saying if lawmakers vote to reopen the government, the legal battle is moot.
In the meantime, Broomfield FISH — a non-profit running a food pantry — said regardless of how lawmakers vote on a funding deal to end the shutdown, they've been preparing for this for two months. Emergency funding has been released and a lot of people stepped up to help.
"We are open and do have a lot of food right now," Dayna Scott with Broomfield FISH said. "And number two, it helps folks save money on other things that they might need to pay for other bills right now. So my advice is, regardless of when the when the dollars hit everyone's EBT cards, it would be beneficial to be relying on food pantries right now."
The states said the new federal guidance for partial benefits comes with new eligibility rules, so not everyone will received 65% of their SNAP benefits.
In an e-mail a spokesperson for CDHS wrote: "With this new federally-mandated calculation, nearly 50,000 households will receive $16 or less."
CDHS shared this online tool to calculate what your payments could look like.
The state also said this situation is rapidly evolving.
Colorado Governor Jared Polis' said:
"Nothing is preventing the Trump administration from fully funding SNAP benefits. They are simply choosing not to. Following court orders last week, the state worked diligently to provide full SNAP benefits. As a result, nearly 32,000 Coloradans received full support to put food on the table before the Administration asked the Supreme Court to halt all efforts to keep children and families fed. The state has not reversed those payments as they were allowed at the time. The state is moving to provide remaining eligible Coloradans SNAP payments in alignment with the updated guidance received from USDA, which allows benefits of up to 65%. Those Coloradans who will get the reduced benefits should begin to see those payments over the next few days. The fastest way to clean up this mess would be for the federal government to drop its court appeals.”
