Alabama families will receive two more rounds of P-EBT payments to cover the 2021-2022 school year and upcoming summer months. Benefits are currently projected to be loaded onto EBT cards June through September.
The school year P-EBT will be issued in two payments tentatively scheduled for June and July. The first payment will cover August-December 2021 and will provide $28.12 per month for a total of $140.60.
The P-EBT program was started by the United States Department of Agriculture at the beginning of the pandemic to provide payments for eligible children who didn’t receive school lunches because of virtual or hybrid learning.
Unlike with previous cycles, this school year’s benefits will only be issued to children under the age of 6 who are enrolled in SNAP. Households will only receive benefits for the months in which they were on SNAP.
Students who receive free and reduced-price meals or whose schools participate in the Community Eligibility Provision, as well as children under the age of 6 who are enrolled in SNAP, are eligible for the summer payment.
The USDA imposed new requirements for the 2021-2022 school year, which said payments would only be available to students who missed school due to COVID-19. P-EBT was previously distributed to children who were remote due to school closures, illness or quarantine, or a family decision to not be in–person
Anjelice Lowe, Child Nutrition Program Director at the Alabama State Department of Education, said school districts were not tracking absences as being COVID-related this past school year, and were therefore unable to develop a system to appropriately distribute funds to students.
“This was a USDA requirement along with other requirements that ALSDE nor [Department of Human Resources] could overcome in order to make an application for those school-aged students,” said Lowe.
Data required for the January-May 2022 benefit calculation is not yet available, according to DHR.
Alabama’s P-EBT program is operated by both ALSDE and DHR. The school-year benefits are predicted to provide $32.4 million to 125,000 SNAP-enrolled families, and the summer P-EBT payments will provide $238.5 million to over 600,000 eligible families.
The summer benefit will issue one standard benefit of $391 to all eligible children in September.
School districts will identify children who were eligible to receive free or reduced price meals as of May 2022 using data collected at the beginning of the 2021-2022 school year.
Households who become newly income-eligible for free or reduced price meals during the summer can apply for the program with their school districts by August 31.
Break for a Plate, a summer food service program that helps Alabama families receive meals, reported that 1 in 4 Alabama children live in families with food hardships and nearly 60% of Alabama public school children eat free/reduced school lunches. Inflation is likely to drive those numbers up this summer, according to research by the Urban Institute.
“Each summer, families with children struggle to meet their food needs as there are limited summer food offerings for school-age children. This summer, establishing food security likely will be harder, as high inflation increases the cost of foods like meats, fresh produce, and dairy and heightens trade-offs families make between food and other rising costs,” stated the report.
To help families, the Summer Food Service Program has begun providing free meals to children 18 years old and younger at locations throughout Alabama. A total of 380 sites where families can pick up meals are expected to open this summer with 100 opening on June 1. There were nearly 1,000 locations last year.
Food pick up locations can be found at this link. Dates of site openings and times of operation vary. Families can text “Summer Meals” to 914-342-7744 or call 1-866-348-6479 to find a site near you.
