(KNSI) – Stearns County is warning residents that the federal government shutdown has led to a pause in enrollment for new applicants in government adminstered food aid programs.
Officials say they had just hours’ notice on Tuesday that approval for any new or pending Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program applications would end. The deadline was pushed to Wednesday night, allowing staff to race to get eligible families on the rolls.
About 15,000 Stearns County families are not out of the woods yet, though. As of now, there will be no SNAP benefits available for the month of November. The Minnesota Family Investment Program (MFIP) and the federal Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) program may also be in trouble.
Staff encourage people to continue to apply and go through the process. They promise to keep ensuring the paperwork enters the queue, which would hopefully position the federal bureaucracy to come storming out of the gates once the impasse on Capitol Hill is finally broken.
The federal government has been shut down since midnight on October 1st.
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