USDA Issues Additional Guidance Clarifying Hmong and Lao Eligibility For Food Stamps under the Agriculture Research, Extension, and Education Reform Act

IMMIGRANTS & PUBLIC BENEFITS

Food and Nutrition Programs

USDA ISSUES ADDITIONAL GUIDANCE CLARIFYING HMONG AND LAO ELIGIBILITY FOR FOOD STAMPS UNDER THE AGRICULTURE RESEARCH, EXTENSION, AND EDUCATION REFORM ACT
Immigrants' Rights Update, Vol. 13, No. 2, April 30, 1999

The Food and Consumer Service (FCS) of the U.S. Department of Agriculture has issued a memorandum to all regional directors of the Food Stamp Program clarifying ambiguities contained in an initial advisory the agency had produced to help state and local agencies implement section 508 of the Agriculture Research, Extension, and Education Reform Act of 1998 (AREERA). The FCS memo is dated Feb. 24, 1999.

Enacted last year, the AREERA restored food stamp eligibility to certain classes of immigrants who had been rendered ineligible by the welfare reform law passed in 1996. Among those to whom eligibility was restored were Hmong and Lao veterans who fought on the U.S. side in the Vietnam War (see "Congress Overwhelmingly Approves Restoration of Food Stamps to Some Immigrants," Immigrants’ Rights update, Jun. 17, 1998, p. 12). Two months in advance of the restoration’s Nov. 1, 1998, effective date, the FCS distributed a Technical Assistance Guide (TAG) that sought to provide detailed information on verifying the eligibility of members of Hmong and other Highland Laotian tribes and their families.

Unfortunately, as detailed in a Jan. 29, 1999, letter from the National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium (NAPALC) to the FCS, the TAG contained a number of problems, foremost among them explanations of the verification and secondary verification process that are too complex. NAPALC also pointed out that the TAG’s reliance on the Refugee Data Center’s (RDC’s) list of known Hmong and Laotian refugees could result in eligibility workers delaying eligibility decisions because not all of them receive copies of the RDC list. Further, the TAG failed to include Hong Kong, Malaysia, and Singapore in the list of countries of birth, and did not clearly state that eligibility workers need not verify the immigration status of a spouse or minor child of a tribal member if the family status has been verified.

However, rather than adopting NAPALC’s suggestion that the TAG be rewritten, the FCS issued the Feb. 24, 1999, memorandum, to which was attached a draft of a letter for regional food stamp directors to send to state agencies. The draft letter makes clear that tribal members whose names or alien numbers do not appear on the RDC list can complete their verification of trial member status by self-declaration in an affidavit. It also emphasizes that eligibility workers should be flexible in accepting reasonable explanations offered by applicants for areas in which their documentation falls short of the basic requirements. Last, the sample letter reiterates that the spouse or dependent minor child of a Hmong or other Highland Laotian tribal member becomes eligible for food stamps simply by virtue of being the spouse or child of the tribal member.