well more than three million people across the country stand to lose their food assistance benefits under a massive tax and spending bill passed by the House late last week new Jerseys Department of Human Services says the measure which has been dubbed the big beautiful bill will increase how much it costs states to run SNAP that's the program that oversees the benefits it serves more than 800,000 New Jersey residents and the federal cuts will require the state and counties to come up with roughly 100 million more per year to keep the program alive raven Santana reports for every meal that a food bank provides in this country SNAP provides nine um the we do not have the resources to meet an increase of need that caused by these snap cuts triata Stampus is the president and CEO of Fulfill one of six food banks in New Jersey that helps serve nearly 1 million people a month stampus expressed concern that deep federal cuts to SNAP formerly known as the food stamps program could leave thousands of families across New Jersey without enough to eat her response comes after the House proposed cutting SNAP funding by approximately $300 billion through 2034 a move that could put those benefits at risk it is massively concerning that this bill with cuts that are nothing short of catastrophic for the people who depend on us for food um was able to pass the House of Representatives it's it's really disappointing and and concerning the House approved bill requires states to pay for a portion of SNAP benefits for the first time equaling $100 million in cost to the state for every 5% then the bill also increases the state's share of stamp administrative cost that's another $100 million new Jerseys three House Republicans who all voted for the bill say that shifting more of the financial burden to states will eliminate waste fraud and abuse no way you can do billions of dollars of cuts and have it not impact the states that that's that's nonsensical that if we're going to make the cuts let's at least acknowledge that the cuts will trickle down and will impact participants counties and the state according to the US Department of Agriculture New Jersey's SNAP payment error rate reached approximately 36% in 2023 drawing criticism of the program however the USDA emphasized that the payment errors are not the same as fraud michael Wilson of the New Jersey Department of Human Services which oversees SNAP in the state says efforts are underway to reduce the error rate we know that the SNAP program is $2.5 billion dollar in the state of New Jersey and those numbers are real and are relevant and I think anybody who thinks that there are significant amounts of waste fraud and ab abuse really is using that as a term of art they're using that as the words that they want to use cuz tell me if if there is fraud going on tell us we want to find it under the bill work requirements in the program would be expanded including expanding work requirements to individuals up to age 64 from 55 currently and extending those requirements to households with children unless their child is under the age of seven children are in households that could SNAP and they end up losing SNAP because of these cuts and changes they could also lose access to free breakfast and lunch at school um and eligibility for some other programs that also provide vital nutrition assistance to our kids hunger New Jerseys Lisa Pittz says the proposed changes to SNAP which effectively function as benefit reductions are expected to have devastating consequences so in New Jersey we have about 800,000 individuals who receive SNAP um of those who receive SNAP about one in five are over the age of 60 so we're really talking about a lot of older adults who may be on fixed incomes who rely on SNAP um we have about half of our SNAP uh folks who rely on SNAP in New Jersey are children um so we're really talking about people who need this benefit to be able to afford and purchase healthy food this is an investment in our children's health it's an investment in our older adults health while food banks and advocates have raised their voices the future of SNAP benefits in New Jersey now hinges on the outcome of ongoing negotiations and votes in Congress for NJ Spotlight News I'm Raven Santana