The Adams administration announced on Monday that it has nearly cleared the backlog of pending food stamp and cash aid cases, after more than a year of record-slow processing times and mounting outcry from beneficiaries and advocates.
Officials with the city Department of Social Services, the agency that oversees public benefits programs, said they have processed more than 600,000 applications since the summer by hiring 1,000 workers, investing in technology and making it easier to use online services.
The turnaround on processing cases within 30 days, as required under federal and state laws, is a major boon for New Yorkers grappling with an affordability crisis who were waiting more than a month for extra aid to buy groceries, pay rent or cover other necessities.
“We acted with urgency to address historic increases in the volume of applications, deploying all agency resources and doubling down on efforts to process a significantly higher number of applications over a very short period of time,” DSS Commissioner Molly Wasow Park said in a statement.
The improvements also meet a federal court order stemming from a class-action lawsuit filed by the nonprofit Legal Aid Society and New York Legal Assistance Group in January 2023 over the delays. The agreement reached with the court last summer mandated fixes due this month.
The Legal Aid Society said it was pleased the city corrected the backlog, but would continue to hold officials accountable for any more delays. “We await further details from the city on how the backlog was reduced to ensure that any eligible household received the benefits entitled to them by the law,” the nonprofit said in a statement.
DSS officials said the backlog of public benefit cases peaked at more than 50,000 in July, with 46,000 pending cash assistance applications and 4,000 applications for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, benefits, which supplement food purchases. The number of cash assistance applications have…
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