Reform SNAP Now or Pay Later

Originally published by Santa Fe New Mexican.

New Mexico is now facing a growing and preventable challenge in its administration of the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. New rules from the federal government have increased states’ responsibilities for administering these benefits accurately, and states with high payment error rates could soon be shouldering the cost of hundreds of millions of dollars annually in SNAP benefits.

SNAP benefits are 100% federally funded, but it is the states that manage the payout of SNAP benefits. State SNAP payment error rates measure how well a state is managing its SNAP program, and New Mexico’s error rate of 14.6% is one of the highest in the country and well above the national average.

Further, almost 90% of those errors are overpayments, which are rarely recouped.

Under the new federal guidelines, states with error rates of 6% or greater will begin cost-sharing up to 15% of benefit costs. For New Mexico, which receives around $1 billion in SNAP benefits each year, that is an annual cost to the state of around to $150 million.

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