With grocery prices soaring, some Kentucky families will get extra help buying food this summer when children are out of school.
Kentucky is one of 35 states that opted into a new federal program that will give families already receiving food stamp benefits an extra $40 per child each month this summer. The additional benefit will last for three months and will be loaded on an EBT card.
The program, administered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, comes at a time when food prices and food insecurity have increased.
Children living in a household receiving food stamps qualify for free or reduced school lunches, but often cannot access those meals when school is out. Kentucky also participates in the country's Summer Food Service Program, which provides sites where kids can eat for free - though there are barriers for some children to accessing those sites.
The cost of groceries, defined as at home food, increased 12.2% between June 2021 and June 2022, the largest 12-month increase since April 1979, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Simultaneously, childhood hunger has been increasing across the country. More than 17% of householdswith children report they didn't have enough to eat at some point in 2022, the most recent year with available data.
The USDA increased benefits for all recipients last year related to inflation, though that doesn't account for the additional meals families provide when students aren't in school.
USA Today contributed to this report. Contact Krista Johnson at kjohnson3@gannett.com.
