This ACL clarifies that Haitian Orphans entering the U.S. after January 12, 2010 with a Form I-94 (Arrival-Departure Record) or with a visa showing they have been lawfully admitted for permanent residence are immediately eligible for food stamps, providing all other requirements for eligibility are met. Sponsor deeming does not apply for these children, nor does the five-year residency requirement. [Download]

The Food Stamp Review and Advisory Team (FRAT) is at it again, with even more questions and answers about Food Stamps. This installment covers how to count weekend days for purposes of expedited food stamp processing, whether to exclude child support payments by a spouse from SSI/SSP funds from income, a couple of state-to-state travel issues, when to remove a child from the food stamp household when he or she is removed and placed in another home, a complicated pro-rating scenario, unavailability of food stamps to a mother whose children are in foster care but stay with her part of each week and exclusion of “Assets for Independence” funds from resources. [Download]

Having been reminded yet again that it cannot make up “extra” rules for federal programs, the State directs the counties in through this ACL to discontinue the practice of imposing food stamp sanctions when a recipient fails to comply with work requirements of a substitute program (GA/GR and Refugee Resettlement Programs). No later than October 25, 2010, counties must stop imposing sanctions required in MPP §63-407.54 when the substitute program work requirements are not also the individual’s Food Stamp Employment and Training (FSET) mandatory assignment. [Download]