![]() ![]() It has continued to expand four years into the recovery because state governments and their partner organizations have become active promoters, creating official “SNAP outreach plans” and hiring hundreds of recruiters like Nerios.Ī decade ago, only about half of eligible Americans chose to sign up for food stamps. The program grew during the economic collapse because 10 million more Americans dropped into poverty. A record 47 million Americans now rely on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), also known as food stamps, available for people with annual incomes below about $15,000. In Florida and everywhere else, the answer in 2013 is almost always yes. Nerios prefers to think of her job in more simple terms: “Help is available,” she tells hundreds of seniors each week. It also adds to rising federal entitlement spending and the U.S. The money helps to sustain communities, grocery stores and food producers. But the job also has a second and more controversial purpose for cash-strapped Florida, where increasing food-stamp enrollment has become a means of economic growth, bringing almost $6 billion each year into the state. Alleviate hunger, lessen poverty: These are the primary goals of her work. In fact, it is Nerios’s job to enroll at least 150 seniors for food stamps each month, a quota she usually exceeds. “Make each person feel like the only one who matters.” “Some seniors haven’t had anyone to talk to in some time,” one of the state-issued training manuals reads. On the drive, Nerios, 56, reviewed techniques she had learned for connecting with some of Florida’s most desperate senior citizens during two years on the job. Her destination on a recent morning was a 55-and-over community in central Florida, where single-wide trailers surround a parched golf course. Then she drove along the Florida coast to sign people up for food stamps. “A happy, it’s-all-good look,” she said, checking her reflection in the rearview mirror. ![]() ![]() She curled her hair and painted her nails fluorescent pink. She packed crates of cookies, croissants, vegetables and fresh fruit. A good recruiter needs to be liked, so Dillie Nerios filled gift bags with dog toys for the dog people and cat food for the cat people. ![]()
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