Eric Aft: Congress should delay SNAP implementation, not accountability

Leading Second Harvest Food Bank has given me a unique perspective on hunger in Northwest North Carolina. It has also taught me that many of the assumptions people hold about who needs food assistance don't reflect reality.

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, serves workers whose hours have been cut or who can't find full-time work, grandparents raising grandchildren, veterans reintegrating into public life, older adults living on fixed incomes, parents balancing costly childcare and low wages, and people living with disabilities. For many, SNAP provides temporary support during a difficult season. For others, it helps bridge the gap when wages, retirement income, or disability benefits fall short.

That reality matters because Congress has changed the rules governing the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) with H.R. 1. Unless states are given sufficient time to adapt, our most vulnerable families and all taxpayers will bear the consequences.

Beginning in October 2026, North Carolina will assume a significantly larger share of SNAP administrative costs. One year later, the state could also become responsible for a portion of SNAP benefit costs, if it fails to meet new federal payment accuracy standards.

We agree that continuous improvements and investments to any government program, including SNAP, are better for everyone. North Carolina should enhance the integrity of SNAP administration, but Congress’ approach to “incentivize” this is misguided and harmful to families and local economies.

Specifically, one of the measures driving these new financial consequences—the SNAP Payment Error Rate—is widely misunderstood or misused for political benefit. It is not a fraud metric. It measures whether benefits were issued in the correct amount based on a household's eligibility and circumstances. Payment errors often reflect rapidly changing household circumstances, outdated software systems, or administrative mistakes made by overburdened agency staff. Those errors should be addressed, but they should not be confused with intentional misuse of the program, which is very low – around 1% - and often committed by large criminal enterprises and not individuals abusing the program.

North Carolina has already made meaningful progress in improving its Payment Error Rate in just the year since Congress deemed this measure would be how states are judged, and, thankfully, our General Assembly has invested additional resources to modernize SNAP administration in preparation for these new federal requirements. Those investments demonstrate a unified commitment to stronger program integrity while effectively serving North Carolinians. State leaders, county agencies, and community partners are working diligently to improve accuracy because accountability matters.

But additional improvements take time. Modernizing technology, strengthening oversight, onboarding and training staff, and helping counties adapt to significant policy changes cannot happen overnight. If the cost share moves forward before those improvements have time to take hold, states could face substantial new financial obligations before they have a fair opportunity to meet Congress's new expectations.

The consequences won't stop at state budgets. County agencies could face greater administrative pressure. Eligible families could experience delays, miss receiving benefits, or face additional barriers to navigating an increasingly complex system.

Ultimately, taxpayers will bear the brunt of this approach. Whether public dollars are spent at the federal level or state level, it is still our tax money. Requiring North Carolina to pay more of the costs doesn’t reduce costs – it merely shifts those costs. Yet, Congress hasn’t proposed giving North Carolinians our tax dollars back that the federal government won’t be using for SNAP as it shifts costs to the states.

Food banks and local food assistance programs — already responding to sustained, historic levels of need and serving twice as many people as we did just over 3 years ago — will be asked to fill gaps that charitable food assistance was never designed to replace. Food banks are an important part of the hunger-relief network, but they cannot replace SNAP's scale, consistency, or purchasing power within our local economies.

Congress shouldn't delay accountability. It should delay implementation.

I encourage you to contact your members of Congress and encourage them to delay the cost shift that will hurt North Carolinians.