SNAP benifits toward restaurant prepared meals? Suggested in NY

If the SNAP benefits are the same amount the person would have gotten for groceries, their money won't last long for restaurants.
 
I remember years ago when the debate was about allowing people to use SNAP for deli style takeout food. That was finally allowed and IMO it helps some folks in center city food deserts to eat better.

Expanding the use of benefits to restaurants seems like another step in that direction. It’s easier to find a McDonalds than a grocery store in many places.
 
Aunt Bea said:
I remember years ago when the debate was about allowing people to use SNAP for deli style takeout food. That was finally allowed and IMO it helps some folks in center city food deserts to eat better.

Expanding the use of benefits to restaurants seems like another step in that direction. It’s easier to find a McDonalds than a grocery store in many places.
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Finding a McDonald's first is a problem. As a dietitian who has consulted with WIC and worked as an area nutrition agent for Extension in the Mississippi Delta, I'd much rather see SNAP food distribution centers--ideally with delivery to those lacking transportation--with a variety of healthy choices located in food deserts. In those settings as well as direct clinical in impoverished areas, I cannot tell you how often I've heard the myth that buying fresh produce is too expensive. Would love to see nutrition education incorporated into SNAP as well.

I don't like the move to covering restaurant foods with SNAP. As @Pepper said, the money will run out quickly. Also, healthy prepared foods are not generally the choice of SNAP recipients based on my experience working with the population.
 
AnnieA said:
Finding a McDonald's first is a problem. As a dietitian who has consulted with WIC and worked as an area nutrition agent for Extension in the Mississippi Delta, I'd much rather see SNAP food distribution centers with a variety of healthy choices located in food deserts. In those settings as well as direct clinical in impoverished areas, I cannot tell you how often I've heard the myth that buying fresh produce is too expensive.

I don't like the move to covering restaurant foods with SNAP. As @Pepper said, the money will run out quickly. Also, healthy prepared foods are not generally the choice of SNAP recipients based on my experience working with the population.
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I don’t disagree but people still need to eat until a better system is in place.
 
AnnieA said:
Understood. I doubt we'll see the things I wish for. Our healthcare and political culture does not do well in promoting early, proactive nutritional intervention for the underprivileged.
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I believe that some of it is happening with young folks in elementary schools and community programs.

Most adults have already established eating
patterns that are not likely to change.

People should have a degree of choice just like they do when shopping in the grocery store. Frozen French fries or salad, bologna or beans, etc..

A quarter pounder with cheese or a slice of pizza may be the only bright spot in their daily struggle with multiple issues.
 
In my city it was shown during the height of the pandemic that there ways of mass producing healthy meals for anyone who needed them (or just wanted to grab freebies) Sr centers that offered breakfast and lunch daily were distributing drive up or walk up meals. Schools which were offering breakfast and lunch daily continued to do so in the same way. And distributed during what would have been vacation. I’m addition there were other feeding sites and food distributions. Nobody checked anyone’s income or credentials. I believe no one should be left to go hungry, but I don’t feel public funds should be used to treat people to restaurants while responsible low income families are making do with cheap but nutritious stuff to afford milk for their kids.
 
Marie5656 said:
I am a NY resident, but I do not feel I would agree with this. I am not sure I would want people to have this added to their benefits, Isee people using this as a reason to not buy healthier foods . I think the concept is to have it be for people who do not have access to kitchens or something.

Urge Governor Hochul to Establish a SNAP Restaurant Meals Program! | AARP
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AARP is pushing to get the law passed for the following reason from your article:

"to help elderly and disabled SNAP recipients who may not have access to a kitchen or the ability to cook. Allowing the use of SNAP benefits to purchase hot and/or prepared foods which would improve their access to nutritious foods and quality of life."

Why do you object?
 
Nosy Bee-54 said:
AARP is pushing to get the law passed for the following reason from your article:

"to help elderly and disabled SNAP recipients who may not have access to a kitchen or the ability to cook. Allowing the use of SNAP benefits to purchase hot and/or prepared foods which would improve their access to nutritious foods and quality of life."
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Maybe there should be an exemption for the elderly and disabled.
 
I have mixed thoughts about this. Where we live, there are a lot of people who wander up and down the street day and night (singing along with their AirPods ), but they don’t cook, they go to the little convenience store on the corner and buy chicken and potato wedges. I am not sure if they can get those with their EBT card or not, but I think that they can.
Also, some of them sell their food stamps for cash and buy drugs; so then they can’t feed their family or themselves at all.

I have seen some come in to the grocery store and get all kinds of snack food with their EBT cards, so that family is obviously NOT eating healthy, even when they are shopping at a grocery store and buying food there.

Meals on Wheels brings food to seniors in many places, and it is free, although people do donate if they can afford it. Our senior center also has meals each day for people, and I think it is a minimum charge, or free if people have no money.
The idea of restaurant foods being added might be well intended, but I think that it would be abused, just like the EBT program already is. French fries and milkshakes at McDonalds, and not Diet Coke and salad with their burger.

What I would like to see them do is add more healthy foods and take off some of the junk foods. Things like protein powder and drinks, protein bars, vitamins, and other health foods are not allowed on food stamps; yet you can buy candy bars and chips and soda pop all day long.
 
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I agree with happy flower lady. If they mean contracting with restaurants to prepare meals similar or equivalent to what meals on wheels, school lunches etc consist of that’s one thing. It just ordering up “ the catch of the day” with a SNAP card doesn’t seem reasonable to me.
Totally agree with allowing health foods on SNAP.
And my long term totally personal quirk is to be extremely suspicious of things that AARP is advocating. Usually means $ profit for them at some level.
 
Geezerette said:
I agree with happy flower lady. If they mean contracting with restaurants to prepare meals similar or equivalent to what meals on wheels, school lunches etc consist of that’s one thing. It just ordering up “ the catch of the day” with a SNAP card doesn’t seem reasonable to me.
Totally agree with allowing health foods on SNAP.
And my long term totally personal quirk is to be extremely suspicious of things that AARP is advocating. Usually means $ profit for them at some level.
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YES!!
 
As a child my family lived several years on government assistance. We were given a lot of plain wrapper bulk food. Today's SNAP is absolutely ridiculous. The recipients can go into the grocery and purchase Lucky Charms and all sorts of worthless food, or drugs.

The issue is not about saving lives, it is about corporate profits. So SNAP continues.

The government could provide for families, and school lunches, ten times what they do with SNAP, if they control the purchases. Rice, beans, powdered greens, powdered milk, cheese, oatmeal, quinoa ... it's a really big list.

But the pretense continues instead.
 
Lawrence00 said:
As a child my family lived several years on government assistance. We were given a lot of plain wrapper bulk food. Today's SNAP is absolutely ridiculous. The recipients can go into the grocery and purchase Lucky Charms and all sorts of worthless food, or drugs.

The issue is not about saving lives, it is about corporate profits. So SNAP continues.

The government could provide for families, and school lunches, ten times what they do with SNAP, if they control the purchases. Rice, beans, powdered greens, powdered milk, cheese, oatmeal, quinoa ... it's a really big list.

But the pretense continues instead.
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The government could open cafeterias to feed indigent people and deliver to those who are immobile, which would be a lot more cost effective than allowing people to go to fast-food restaurants with their SNAP cards. If they can make it out to the restaurant, they can probably get a job. Considering there's a worker shortage right now, maybe we should re-evaluate who is eligible for SNAP benefits. It might be alright for the elderly, though.
 
Aunt Bea said:
...

People should have a degree of choice just like they do when shopping in the grocery store. Frozen French fries or salad, bologna or beans, etc..

A quarter pounder with cheese or a slice of pizza may be the only bright spot in their daily struggle with multiple issues.
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The stresses are pretty constant if you qualify for SNAP. Developing lifestyle related chronic diseases doesn't help with the struggles. I worked nine years in dialysis and would guess well over 60% could've been prevented with early nutritional intervention.
 
No matter what people buy with their food stamps, others will always complain. The real problem is that the food industry has developed processed foods that are highly processed and made with questionable ingredients. Healthy food is more expensive and not affordable, even to those on food stamps. Just walking through a medical facility and seeing the employees and yes, even doctors and nurses are not at the perfect weight and condition. So enforcing healthy food on everyone instead of giving them a choice of what to buy is taking away yet another freedom.

NY is giving free food boxes to seniors and it had healthy foods in it including some snacks too. They also give seniors with lower incomes a booklet of $20. coupons for the local farmer's markets. That is also sponsored by SNAP. I think if people can buy restaurant food with food stamps they will still buy food at the grocery stores. Some people live in rooms with no kitchen and some cannot even have a microwave.
 
I don't think SNAP benefits should be used to control what poor people eat. The rest of us get to eat whatever we like. And many of us eat unhealthily. When we first moved to my town, the number of overweight people was astonishing. The percentage is much higher here than where we used to live. This is not intended to bash overweight people -- it is intended to point out that we do not have to control what a segment of our population eats when we don't do that for anyone else.
 

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