Wilmington's poor fear losing assistance if government shutdown continues

Brittany Muhammad already lives with constant uncertainty. 

Whether or not she'll get any hours for her job as an on-call senior resident aide changes week to week.

Her fluctuating income then affects how much she and her two children receive in federally funded housing subsidies and benefits from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), also known as food stamps.

But as the longest federal government shutdown in U.S. history stretched through its fourth week, Muhammad and other low-income Delawareans were thrown into a different kind of uncertainty: whether they'll be able to afford food or rent at all in another month. 

On Thursday, the Delaware Department of Health and Social Services issued February's food stamps early to the 136,000 residents who receive the benefits and urged them to budget accordingly.

That was necessary to ensure the state could take advantage of an obscure provision of the now-expired funding bill for the U.S. Department of Agriculture in time to get recipients their food stamps for another month. 

February food stamps to come early amid government shutdown

But unless the shutdown ends before, there is no funding to pay for SNAP benefits in March. Also in March, public housing authorities won't have the money to pay rent to landlords for low-income residents. 

"It just puts us in a tight position," Muhammad said. "We gotta make the food last."

Residents in a low-income neighborhood of Wilmington's West Center City on Friday spoke of their anxieties as the shutdown showed no signs of ending.

They were thinking of ways to stretch their food stamps, to prepare for March rolling around without a payment. Some discussed getting a deep freezer to store food for a long period of time. 

Many expressed fears they were required to spend their February food stamps by Feb. 28, a rumor that DHSS spokeswoman Jill Fredel said is not true. 

Diamond Sharp said she was prepared to stock up on cereal and milk. She receives about $300 a month in SNAP benefits for herself and her 5-year-old son, and said she and the rest of her family have been talking all week about how to make their groceries last. 

"The supermarkets are so jammed-packed, everybody's trying to buy in bulk," Sharp said. 

Sharp, her son, sister and her children live with their mother, Mildred Cropper, in a subsidized apartment. Cropper pays a portion of her income from her $11.50-an-hour job at Walmart toward rent; subsidies from the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development pay the rest.

On Friday, they were moving to a new place around the block, which will also be subsidized. 

"Without the subsidies I would probably be bouncing from house to house," Cropper said.

If the subsidies run out in March, she said the family won't have anyone to turn to.

"It's just me," she said. "I don't know, I'm just going day by day."

John Hill, director of the Wilmington Housing Authority, said he issues $1.3 million of HUD-funded vouchers each month to landlords in the area.

The local agency only has $650,000 in reserves for those programs, not enough to pay all the landlords if federal funding does not come through in March.

Hill said he's beginning to send letters to landlords who receive subsidies to ask them to be patient. But he acknowledged landlords have the legal right to start evictions if they do not receive full rent.

The Wilmington Housing Authority subsidizes rent for about 1,900 households, Hill said. Jessica Eisenbrey of the Delaware State Housing Authority said the agency only has voucher funds through February.

"This could mushroom into a really horrible situation," Hill said. "We've never been here before in the history of housing in the history of our country."

Losing housing or food benefits could destabilize not only the recipient's life but also the network of assistance low-income families rely on. 

Tara Lewis, a hair stylist who is looking for work, is staying with her sister in a subsidized apartment. Lewis's sister also receives SNAP benefits for herself and her three daughters, Lewis said. The family is planning on stocking up on meat and crates of water.

They could ask their mother and aunt for help if they lost the apartment, but the older family members also live in a subsidized unit. 

"We're going to have to figure something out," Lewis said.

Jessie Johnson, who lives in a senior apartment in downtown Wilmington, receives $192 a month in SNAP benefits, his only income aside from the $79 cash assistance check he gets from the state. Johnson is retired, after working three decades in Wilmington hotels, setting up banquet tables.

He said he could depend on his family if SNAP is not funded in March, but he likes to cook and be independent, and enjoys sharing his cooking with neighbors.

"It'll hurt, but I will survive," Johnson said. "But I don't think it's fair for Trump to take something from us. I worked all my life."

Others were less certain about their futures. Muhammad, the mother with the fluctuating work hours, was planning to save some of her food stamp money to buy her daughter a birthday cake for her fourth birthday. 

She settled for a couple of cupcakes instead, not knowing when the next payment will come. Through tears, she said she doesn't know what to do if she loses her housing subsidies.

"I have no plan," she said. "I'm real-life winging it."

Contact Jeanne Kuang at jkuang@delawareonline.com or (302) 324-2476. Follow her on Twitter at @JeanneKuang.

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