Food Stamps

The Department of Agriculture is looking into allegations that employees at Benjamin Franklin High School accepted food stamps as payment for temporary school ID when students arrived without their required photo ID cards. Meanwhile, the School District's Office for School Safety has launched its own investigation. As of yesterday, John J. McLees, the district's executive director for school safety, said his office had concluded that food stamps had not been used in place of a $1 fee for temporary ID at Franklin High.

Bucks County restaurateur Bruno Mannello didn't like his sister's sweetheart, and he'll have up to 10 years in prison to think about all the trouble this caused. The prospective brother-in-law, Frank Hutchinson, worked in Mannello's restaurant but "was totally useless," Mannello's defense attorney A. Charles Peruto Sr., told a judge yesterday. So when Hutchinson approached Mannello with a scheme to steal food stamps, Mannello figured it would end the dependency, added Peruto.

HARRISBURG - The Pennsylvania Public Welfare Department will start asking food-stamp recipients next week to prove they do not have significant personal assets in order to qualify for benefits. Advocates for the poor say the new policy will be expensive to administer and hurt families for whom the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program can be a lifeline. It goes into effect Tuesday, but it will be about six months before the department knows how many have lost benefits. "The majority who will lose benefits - the significant majority - are seniors and people with disabilities," Julie Zaebst, policy center manager for the Greater Philadelphia Coalition Against Hunger, said Friday.

People who are eligible for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program - SNAP, formerly known as food stamps - have two ways to make the most of their purchasing power. One is Philly Food Bucks, a program of the Food Trust. Shoppers who spend $5 on produce at one of the more than 25 farmer's markets operated by the Food Trust get a $2 Philly Food Buck in return, on the spot. A list of those markets is at www.thefoodtrust.org . Or call the Food Trust at 215-575-0444. The other program, Double Dollars, is available only at the Fair Food Farmstand in the Reading Terminal Market.

Regardless of where you stand on taxpayer-funded entitlements, few Americans argue against the maintenance of temporary safety nets or modifications aimed at ending welfare fraud, waste, and abuse. In hopes of protecting both interests, the Pennsylvania Department of Public Welfare recently re-implemented an asset test for food stamps. An asset test looks at the total wealth of an individual before granting taxpayer assistance. Until 2008, Pennsylvania was using such a test. Asset tests represent an important first step toward preserving limited taxpayer resources for the truly needy.

Corliss Faison, 39, fell in love with Louis Butcher, 56, and was "conned" into using her position as a social worker with the Department of Public Welfare to set up two phony accounts to see to it that he received cash and food stamps illegally in 1982, according to Assistant District Attorney Thomas Gilson. Yesterday, Faison, of Lambert Street near Chew Avenue, pleaded guilty to forgery, welfare fraud, conspiracy and theft by deception. Common Pleas Judge Michael R. Stiles placed her on five years' probation and ordered her to repay $4,410.

Standing by the register in an Acme the other day, Sonya watched the groceries glide by and listened intently to the cash register. With each jingle, she swallowed a little. "Stop when it gets to $80, OK?" said the mother of one. The clerk forgot, though, and two minutes later, Sonya, a compact woman in a parka who receives federal aid for food, was digging through her six bags of groceries to find $10 worth of crackers and snacks that she could give back. It could have been any mother shopping who was short on food stamps - except that for Sonya and 5,000 others in Reading, food stamps no longer exist.

A federal grand jury has accused a North Philadelphia store owner of illegally trafficking in $4.3 million worth of federal food stamps over the last four years. Wade Friday, 48, of the 7900 block of Ronaele Drive in Elkins Park, was charged in a sealed indictment Thursday with conspiracy, 10 counts of food-stamp fraud, and 197 counts of money laundering involving the operation of his Syreeta's Lounge in the 2400 block of Allegheny Avenue and two other stores. Friday was being held in federal custody yesterday pending posting of four properties worth more than $100,000 to back a bail bond.

TRENTON - Nearly one in five New Jersey households that received emergency food stamps after Tropical Storm Irene last year was ineligible for the benefits, a review found - a result of mistakes, confusion, and fraud. The emergency Disaster Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (D-SNAP) has been around for nearly 40 years as one of the federal government's ways to provide food in disasters. While other states have used it before, New Jersey activated D-SNAP for the first time after Irene, which caused power outages affecting two million homes and massive flooding when it hit at just below hurricane level last August.

WASHINGTON - Republicans controlling the House are eyeing big cuts to food stamps as they piece together legislation to trim $261 billion from the federal budget over the next decade, hoping to forestall major Pentagon cutbacks. The cuts to food stamps would reduce the monthly benefit for a family of four by almost $60, repealing increases enacted three years ago as part of President Obama's economic stimulus. The changes would also force up to three million people out of the program by tightening eligibility rules, the administration estimates.