Connecticut is stepping in to help residents who rely on food assistance and lost their groceries when the power went out during the recent storms, according to News 12. The move offers a measure of relief to families who watched the contents of their refrigerators go to waste through no fault of their own.
According to the report, the state Department of Social Services is reimbursing people enrolled in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, known as SNAP, whose food spoiled during the outages that followed the severe weather.
There is a threshold to qualify. Officials say that to be eligible, recipients must be able to demonstrate that they lost power for at least four consecutive hours, the point at which refrigerated food is generally considered at risk.
The state has also laid out what applicants will need to provide. According to officials, residents will need a letter from their power company or another qualified source to document the outage, and they must submit their application within about the next week and a half.
For those affected, the reimbursement was welcome news. April Reyes, a 19-year-old from Bridgeport, said she was thrilled to hear the state was stepping in, noting that families did not ask for the power to go out and lose everything in their fridge.
She said it was reassuring to be able to recover some of the money and food that had been lost, and officials pointed residents to further details on how to apply as the deadline approached.