Across Kentucky, rising food prices, the loss of expanded free school meals, and back-to-school expenses are placing increasing pressure on family budgets. For households already living paycheck to paycheck, even modest increases in costs can force difficult choices between groceries and necessities like rent, utilities, transportation, and medicine.

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as food stamps, is more than a food assistance program. 

• It helps children grow and learn, improves health outcomes, reduces poverty, and provides an economic boost to local communities. 
• It helps schools afford to feed all students for free through the Community Eligibility Provision by increasing eligibility and automatically enrolling students in free and reduced meals. 
• Every dollar spent through SNAP generates an estimated $1.50 to $1.80 in economic activity as families purchase food from Kentucky grocery stores, farmers, and retailers.

Recent policy shifts, such as 2025’s federal H.R.1, officially titled the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, are changing how SNAP works and who is able to access it. While these changes are often framed as technical adjustments, their impact is very real for families and state budgets. 

For states, the biggest change is that they will now have to pay a percentage of the cost of SNAP benefits if their error rate is above a certain threshold. The federal government has paid the entire cost of SNAP benefits since the program started in 1964, and this change will shift billions of dollars per year to state budgets for unintentional over- and underpayments that result from agency errors or families struggling to navigate confusing eligibility requirements. Thankfully, Kentucky’s error rate was low enough that we would not have to put state funding towards the program, but this could change in the future.

One of the most significant changes for Kentuckians is the expansion of work requirements for certain adults, including adults with older children (14-17), and young adults who aged out of foster care. These rules make it harder for some individuals to qualify for or maintain benefits, especially those who are between jobs, live in areas with limited economic opportunities, or face barriers such as limited transportation or poor health. 

Although these requirements target adults, approximately two in five Kentucky SNAP recipients are under the age of 18, meaning children are inevitably affected when household resources shrink. Young people aging out of foster care also already face significant barriers to achieving economic stability and completing postsecondary education. Additional work requirements make it harder for these young adults to remain enrolled in school while meeting basic needs. 

Other eligibility changes have also increased administrative barriers. Families now have fewer opportunities to easily deduct household expenses from their SNAP income, and some families may now face shorter certification periods. For busy parents juggling work, child care, and other responsibilities, these hurdles can lead to benefits being disrupted or discontinued not because of a lack of need, but because of complex systems.

Kentucky is already seeing the consequences of these changes. 

Since October 2025, more than 40,000 households across Kentucky have lost SNAP benefits, which encompasses over 27,000 kids. With school out for summer and rising grocery prices, the need for SNAP in Kentucky has never been clearer. More than one in five children live in a food-insecure household, with the most recently available data showing that childhood food insecurity has worsened in 119 of Kentucky’s 120 counties. 

When families lose SNAP, they rarely have a safety net to fall back on. Many turn to food banks and community organizations, which are already stretched thin and cannot fully replace the scale or consistency of SNAP.

TAKE ACTION:

Congress is currently considering the next Farm Bill, which determines federal funding and policies for SNAP. This provides an important opportunity for lawmakers to protect families from harmful benefits and eligibility changes. Contact your U.S. Senators today and urge them to use the Farm Bill to restore SNAP access, delay harmful provisions of H.R. 1, and protect the nation’s most effective tool for fighting hunger.