As economic pain of pandemic widens, need for food stamps soars

According to the Hawaiʻi State Department of Human Services (DHS), the number of residents receiving SNAP benefits has risen from about 155,000 last year to 179,000. That’s a 15.4 percent increase.

That surge in demand has contributed to a backlog. Hancock said her application has been delayed by two months and that she’s still waiting for approval. She said she has applied several times.

There’s another reason for the log jam.

The federal government used to require states to interview new applicants but it waived that requirement at the beginning of the pandemic. But that waiver expired in August.

“Our state, like every state, had a backlog of like five months of eligibility interviews and re-certifications and so some people ran into long wait periods. They probably got caught in that huge wave," said Nicole Woo, policy analyst at the Hawaiʻi Appleseed Center for Law & Economic Justice.

Woo, who spoke with the DHS about the backlog on Wednesday, said the good news is that the federal government once again dropped the interview requirement at the end of September.