Editor’s note: This story is the first in a series about changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, sometimes called food stamps.
County governments across North Carolina are bearing the brunt of changes to funding for federal food assistance — SNAP, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.
Soon, local governments will face even more costs tied to the program.
This month, under changes in the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” North Carolina counties went from paying for 50% of SNAP’s administrative costs to 75%. The federal government’s contribution shrank from 50%to 25%.
The pressure comes amid reports of increased demand from food banks and nonprofits across the state.
New work requirements and other changes for SNAP, or food stamps, recipients started rolling out last December after Congress passed the far-reaching tax and spending bill.
Data from the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services (N.C. DHHS) showed the number of SNAP participants in the state dropped consistently over the last 13 months. Still, more than 1.2 million people in the state used food stamps as of August, and the number of people trying to access the program has held steady.
“Applications for SNAP in North Carolina have not decreased. The state received about the same number of applications in the first eight months of 2026 as in the same months of 2025,” state Department of Health and Human Services spokesperson Sean Doyle told NC Local via email.
Costs move to counties
The shift to make counties pay three-quarters of the administrative burden adds about $52 million in new costs collectively.
Starting in October 2027, states will also pay when their payment error rates — a measure of incidents when benefits are given out incorrectly — go above 6%. North Carolina’s 2025 fiscal year rate was 7.36%, according to the federal government.
The state’s new budget includes a provision that shifts the cost of errors to counties.
Under the provision, every county will pay a flat fee: 0.75% of its sales tax revenue. Counties with errors will pay even more based on a formula that includes how much of the state’s error rate they account for and how much sales tax revenue they generate.
County commissioners have criticized the move.
“I don’t care if you’re Mecklenburg County or if you’re the poorest county in the state,” North Carolina Association of County Commissioners Government Relations Manager Andrew Blackburn told NC Local. “Whatever your share of that error rate is going to be, that’s squeezing a budget that’s already constrained because it’s getting more expensive to run government.”
In addition to the added expense, the changes increase the workload for county social services offices that manage the day-to-day application and distribution process for SNAP benefit recipients.
Social services staff are already stretched thin, according to the N.C. DHHS. Along with SNAP, they are responsible for veterans benefits, foster care, disability assistance and much more.
Blackburn said staff are taking their responsibility to lower the payment error rates in their counties seriously.
Big and small counties both affected
Stantavia Wright, who supervises food and nutrition services for Wake County Social Services, said her county is juggling support for recipients while working to lower its 7.2% payment error rate. That has required some reorganizing.
A larger team than usual is combing through “high risk” cases that might require more review, such as when more than five people live in a home, or when someone’s situation may be more complex because they are self-employed, she said.
“As soon as we got the word that there was penalties attached and this bill was coming down, we started migrating people over to that side of the house to help,” she said, adding that more training on error cases has been given to staff as well.
Even in a small county with zero flagged errors, staffers are under new duress knowing that small mistakes could have an outsized cost on the county, Clay County Department of Social Services Director Todd Goins said.
The administrative costs will have a big effect too, he said.
“It’s hard to put all of this on a county, especially a small county,” he said. “Our revenue is so small anyway.”
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