RIPR News
(2011-11-23)
PROVIDENCE, RI
(RIPR) -
Let food stamp recipients spend a little extra during the holidays just like everyone else. That's the message from the George Wiley Center, an advocacy group for low income Rhode Islanders. It's opposed to the state's decision to stop offering the benefits a few days before Thanksgiving and Christmas. Operations manager Maggi Rogers says food stamps don't expire, and recipients don't have to spend them early.
"So no one is harmed by releasing them early, except that the suggestion is that low income household equals irresponsible and therefore can't make their own decisions," she says.
Rogers says the George Wiley Center led a grass root organizing effort to offer the food stamps early in response to requests from low-income Rhode Islanders. The state says the program meant many recipients ran out of food in mid January.
Do you have insight or expertise on this topic? Please email us, we'd like to hear from you. news@wrni.org.
© Copyright 2012, RIPR
