The Examiner U-46 News FeedU-46 primed to expand its food stamp program By Seth Hancock
The State of Illinois is $169 billion in debt and rising fast, according to usdebtclock.org, but that isn’t stop Springfield from expanding welfare.
School District U-46 is advertising the Pandemic Electronic Benefit Transfer (P-EBT), an expansion to the current food stamp program.
In a message from U-46 Superintendent Tony Sanders, he said the P-EBT is “for students who would have received free or reduced-price school lunches in school” but “are not receiving these meals during the school day” because of the decision to shutdown schools due to COVID-19.
The taxpayer funded cards will be sent to all parents whose students were considered qualified, which is supposed to be checked by school districts, without applying for it. They will receive $6.82 for every day a child was not in class, even if they freely chose remote learning, for the entire school year and regardless if the students picked up the taxpayer funded meal handouts by the school district.
No information was provided on how the state will determine if a student was in-person or remote.
The handout is not only for citizens but also those illegally here.
“There is no need to apply and a student or family’s immigration or citizenship status does not affect eligibility,” Sanders wrote.
Illinois remains the worst state in the nation according to George Mason University’s Mercatus Center’s ranking of the states for fiscal health, and truthinaccounting.org ranks in 49th.
“This report shows that Illinois went into the coronavirus pandemic in dire fiscal health, and it will probably come out of the crisis even worse,” Truth in Accounting writes. “Based upon the state’s latest audited financial report, which is dated before the crisis began, Illinois had a ‘Taxpayer Burden’ of $52,000, earning it an ‘F’ grade from Truth in Accounting.”
|