Oregon announced that it is tightening eligibility requirements for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as food stamps, starting this month.
The changes bring the state into compliance with H.R.1, the Republican tax and spending cut bill that Congress passed on July 4. But Oregon’s Democratic leaders are not happy with the changes.
“The federal cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) are simply wrong, and they will hurt Oregon families. I strongly oppose these changes,” Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek wrote in a prepared statement.
“Our top priority now is making sure every impacted Oregonian knows what’s changing and where to turn for help.”
The bill reduces federal spending on nutrition programs nationwide by $187 billion over 10 years, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service.
Its provisions will reduce the monthly benefit amounts some households receive and make it more difficult for some people to qualify for food aid.
The average household benefit is $313 per month in Oregon, and the average individual benefit is $183 a month.
In Oregon, one of the biggest changes to the program is coming at the end of the year. That’s when the state will have to roll out work requirements in rural counties in central, southern, and eastern parts of the state that have often been exempted from them.
Job scarcity no longer matters
Historically, Oregon has been able to qualify for county-level waivers to SNAP work requirements.
Those requirements hold that able-bodied adults who are not caring for children have to work, volunteer, or participate in education or training for 80 hours a month in order to qualify for food aid.
Prior to July 4, states could apply to the U.S. Department of Agriculture for geographic waivers to work requirements for areas with unemployment over 10% or if they could show an area did not have adequate jobs.
H.R.1 narrowed the criteria for those geographic waivers. Now they are only available for areas with unemployment over 10%
This year, Oregon has an exemption for 30 of its 36 counties based on the inadequate jobs criteria. That means that the only counties where Oregonians are potentially required to work to qualify for SNAP benefits are areas with stronger job markets: Multnomah, Washington, Clackamas, Yamhill, Hood River and Benton.
At a briefing for the senate Interim Committee on Health Care in the state Legislature, Oregon human services officials said that none of Oregon’s counties will meet the 10% unemployment threshold and qualify for a waiver next year. Some tribal lands of the Burns Paiute Tribe, Cow Creek Band of the Umpqua Tribe, Klamath Tribes and Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians may qualify.
When the state’s waivers expire at the end of the year, up to 310,000 more people will need to be individually evaluated to see if the work requirements apply to them.
The nonprofit NeighborImpact runs the regional food bank in Central Oregon.
Scott Cooper, NeighborImpact’s executive director, says he thinks that many SNAP recipients will be able to meet the work requirement — through training, volunteering or working. He remembers times in the past when individual counties lost their waivers and implemented work requirements, and most people kept their benefits.
“I just don’t see that many people getting cut off,” he said. “And frankly, I don’t see it as all that unreasonable that people who are in the working age group should work if they can.”
Cooper thinks some specific groups will struggle to comply: people acting as caregivers for elderly or disabled family members, and people who are underskilled and have no degree. “There’s no work out there for them. That’s why we have SNAP. It’s a threshold program to keep people from starving to death,” he said.
And he’s concerned about the accumulation of several federal cuts that are hitting the state’s safety net in rapid succession.
Cuts to food supplies for food banks, cuts to free lunch programs for schools, cost-shifting that will eventually leave the state paying a much higher share of the total cost of the SNAP program.
The end result of all of it, Cooper said, is more mouths to feed and less food to feed them with. That means if people do lose their SNAP benefits, food banks are going to struggle to meet the need.
“If the state assumes that food bank capacity is there, it isn’t,” he said.
Homeless, veterans and refugees see changes
The Republican’s federal tax and spending bill makes numerous other changes to the SNAP work requirements and who is eligible for the food assistance program.
According to officials with the state Department of Human Services, the changes will make it harder for some parents, homeless people, veterans and former foster youth to qualify for food aid.
One of the changes is an expansion of the SNAP work requirement for several new groups.
Those changes are going into effect immediately in the six counties without geographic waivers this year.
The new work requirement rules will go into effect in the rest of the state in January 2026.
Previously, the work requirement applied only to adults ages 18 to 54 without a child under 18 in their SNAP household.
Now, in the six counties where the changes are rolling out, adults ages 55-64 will need to comply with the work requirement or lose their SNAP benefit. The work requirement will also apply for the first time to parents with children ages 14-18.
H.R. 1 also removes exemptions to the work requirement for people experiencing homelessness, veterans and former foster youth.
According to state officials, this year those exemptions included 24,271 individuals who were homelessness, 1,245 veterans, and 209 former foster youth who received food aid.
Another change: Refugees and asylum seekers will no longer qualify for any SNAP benefits. Refugees and asylum seekers are people who have fled persecution and violence in their home countries and been granted the legal right to remain in the United States, with a path to future citizenship.
“This is one of the most concerning proposed changes,” ODHS senior advisor Dana Hittle told the state committee this week, saying it will eliminate benefits for some refugee children who may face hunger as a result.
ODHS says the eligibility changes will go into effect immediately for people newly applying for SNAP benefits and will phase in over the next few months for people already enrolled in the program.
The majority of Oregonians receiving SNAP benefits live in rural and frontier counties, and more than 54% of Oregonians participating in SNAP are in households with children in them, according to ODHS officials.
This story comes to you from the Northwest News Network, a collaboration between public media organizations in Oregon and Washington.
