EBT customer service updates, Unemployment news, public charge + MCLE training

A variety of updates on P-EBT, President Biden's planned Executive Actions today, Unemployment and more! 

 

 

 

Since P-EBT rolled out last spring, families have been confused about how to PIN their cards. Conduent is the EBT vendor in Massachusetts (DTA contracts with Conduent). At long last, Conduent's EBT customer service line (1-800-997-2555) includes P-EBT specific information in a number of languages. Attached is a phone tree provided by DTA - with notes from MLRI - explaining the new options. 

 

Reminder that families can get a replacement P-EBT card or learn their child's case number to PIN the card at DTAConnect.com/PEBT 

 

 

The White House has provided an outline of the immigration related Executive Orders the President is signing today. One of the orders instructs federal agencies to review the Public Charge rule. Click here for a statement from the White House. 

 

While we continue to advocate for the Trump Administration's extremely harmful public charge rules to be changed, our messaging to families is the same:

 

1. Getting SNAP on behalf of eligible family members - such as US Citizen kids - does not harm the immigrant. 

2. The vast majority of immigrants eligible for SNAP are NOT subject to public charge. 

 

With a new federal administration, we hope that some fear in our immigration communities will subside and folks will apply for the benefits they are eligible for. To learn more about the SNAP rules for immigrants....

 

 

 

 

Today's Boston Globe had powerful and heart wrenching stories from families desperately waiting for their Unemployment benefits to come through. A few things to keep in mind for SNAP:

 

1. If workers are waiting for unemployment to come through, they should absolutely apply for SNAP. DTA should not hold up the SNAP application due to uncertainty around unemployment! 

2. If workers are getting unemployment, the $300/week boost does NOT count as income! Please review and share widely this MLRI flier on SNAP and unemployment. 

3. DTA should not count income households are not getting - so if unemployment benefits are held up due to identity verification issues, DTA should NOT be counting those "held up" benefits as income! 

 

Please let us know what you are seeing when it comes to unemployment and SNAP. 

Over the weekend, DTA issued a press release with an overview of the 15% boost and updates on other items. We wanted to flag the data on federal nutrition dollars included -  "As a result of the emergency allotments, $389 million of federal funds have been brought into the local economy. The 15% increase in SNAP benefits is estimated to bring over $30 million per month of additional funds into our state and local economies."