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LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen reversed course on Monday and introduced that the state will settle for roughly $18 million in federal funding to assist feed hungry youngsters over the summer time break.
Pillen introduced in December that the state would reject the funding, defending his place by stating, “I don’t imagine in welfare.” However he got here beneath intense strain, together with from some members of his celebration, to just accept the cash.
At a information convention Monday, Pillen stated he determined to just accept cash allotted by way of the U.S. Division of Agriculture after assembly with a gaggle of highschool college students from round Nebraska who visited the state Capitol this month.
“They talked about being hungry, they usually talked concerning the summer time USDA program and, relying upon entry, once they’d get a sack of meals,” Pillen stated. “And from my seat, what I noticed there, we’ve got to do higher in Nebraska.”
The Summer time Digital Advantages Switch for Kids — or Summer time EBT — program was extensively employed as a part of federal help made out there in the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, after which made everlasting in 2022. It offers pre-loaded EBT playing cards to low-income households, these whose youngsters are eligible totally free and reduced-price lunches at college, and those that are already on meals help, Medicaid and different help packages. These households would obtain $40 per eligible little one for every of three summer time months. The playing cards can be utilized to purchase groceries, just like how SNAP advantages are used.
Stress from lawmakers, explicit these from rural areas, additionally performed a component in Pillen’s about-face. The governor beforehand argued that Nebraska would proceed to assist food-insecure youngsters by way of the Summer time Meals Service Program, a separate program that gives meals and snacks at numerous websites when college shouldn’t be in session. However critics countered that not all households have entry to the on-site packages, notably in Nebraska’s huge rural stretches, the place the websites will be removed from struggling households.
A invoice from state Sen. Jen Day of Omaha, a Democrat within the formally nonpartisan Legislature, would have pressured the state to just accept the federal funding. The bipartisan help for this system grew to become clear when Republican state Sen. Ray Aguilar, of Grand Island, made Day’s invoice his precedence for the session, giving it a very good likelihood to be debated by the total Legislature.
Aguilar was amongst two dozen Republican lawmakers who appeared with Pillen at Monday’s information convention.
Nebraska was one among 15 states — all with Republican governors — that opted out of receiving the funding this 12 months. These states embrace neighboring Iowa, the place Gov. Kim Reynolds criticized the federal meals program as doing “nothing to advertise diet at a time when childhood weight problems has grow to be an epidemic.
Reynolds’ workplace declined to reply questions Monday about whether or not she is holding to her rejection of the funding.
State Sen. Megan Hunt, of Omaha, thanked Pillen for deciding to just accept the funding.
“This goes to point out that every one voices make a constructive distinction, and that onerous work and constructing help throughout the state and throughout the political spectrum on widespread floor points to assist Nebraskans and convey our tax {dollars} house is a win for everybody,” Hunt tweeted.
The deadline for states to declare that they’re collaborating this summer time had been Jan. 1, however the USDA prolonged it to Thursday.
Pillen stated Monday that Nebraska officers had already reached out to the USDA to substantiate that the state would take part this 12 months.
The USDA didn’t instantly reply to telephone and electronic mail messages asking whether or not any of the opposite holdout states have indicated they plan to take part in any case this 12 months.
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