3,755 Households in the U.S. Virgin Islands Receive Automatic Replacement SNAP Benefits: Payments Equal to 30 Percent of the Prior Month Allotment Were Deposited on November 7 After Late October Power Outages
U.S. Virgin Islands — Governor Albert Bryan Jr. announced on November 9 that 3,755 households on St. Thomas and St. John have received automatic replacement Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits following the prolonged power outages in late October, to help families who lost food during the electrical disruptions.
The replacement benefits were deposited directly onto eligible households Electronic Benefit Transfer cards on Saturday, November 7, the territorial government said. The deposits followed federal approval of a request to waive the normal application and affidavit requirements, and affected households received replacement benefits equal to 30 percent of their previous month SNAP allotment without submitting individual applications, through the Virgin Islands Department of Human Services and authorization from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
For families already struggling to make ends meet, losing a refrigerator full of groceries is a serious financial burden, Governor Bryan said at his weekly Government House briefing. We did not want people standing in lines or filling out paperwork to replace food they lost because of the outages. We went to the federal government, requested the assistance and got it directly onto their EBT cards.
The governor thanked Human Services Commissioner Averil George and her team for their swift response, while acknowledging the continuing need to improve electrical reliability throughout the territory. The same briefing covered separate announcements on the Veterans Drive Phase 2 project and federal approval of 18 Opportunity Zones.
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: Wikipedia/Wikimedia Commons 词条主图：Saint John, U.S. Virgin Islands
