Extending Food Stamps To Pets: He’d Rather Lose Power Than Dog

ISOLA, MS — Edward B. Johnston Jr. doesn’t have much left. For the most part, it’s just him and Little Boo, a stray dog that showed up at the rural Mississippi house he’s living in a couple of years ago. Johnston would rather live in the dark than give up Boo — a real possibility if he can’t convince a local social services agency to continue paying his light bill.

Johnston, 58, isn’t being dramatic. He sold everything he had of any value before he joined tens of millions of Americans who keep hunger at bay with food stamps. He can buy $192 worth of groceries with his monthly debit card, but with no income, he can’t afford to give Boo a decent meal.

“That’s just not right,” Johnston told Patch. “It’s not Boo’s fault that I can’t afford to feed him.”

So he started an online petition that has been signed by more than 231,000 people who think people who receive SNAP — the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program — benefits should be able to buy food for their companion animals.

Such petitions carry little weight with policymakers, and the timing of this one to expand SNAP so people can feed their pets couldn’t be worse. President Trump has proposed a 30 percent cut in the nutrition program, which at an annual cost of about $70.9 billion, makes up less than 2 percent of the federal budget.

The cuts would leave millions of hungry Americans even hungrier, according to a recent study from the Urban Institute that shows the meager monthly allotments won’t buy a decent meal in 99 percent of U.S. counties — let alone pet food. About 44 million Americans currently get food stamp assistance, according to the study. And for 8.5 million American families, SNAP is the sole source of food.

As one of them, Johnston just wants to take care of his dog — his family — beyond the life of a $25 gift card to a pet store “a lady was kind enough to give me,” he said.

“Being poor is hard enough without being expected to give up your companion,” he wrote on the petition, directed to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which administers the nutrition program. “For most people, pets are considered family, not property.”

And though it may carry little weight with policymakers, the care2 petition has attracted animal-welfare groups that say extending the use of food stamps to pets could keep thousands of pets out of shelters — a fate Johnston worries about with his Boo. It would mean almost certain death for the dog, he said.

Johnston’s life wasn’t always this desolate, and he knows he’s more fortunate that many people living on almost nothing. He doesn’t have to pay rent. He moved in with his father several years ago to help him manage Alzheimer’s disease, and when he moved to a nursing home, Johnston stayed on at the farmhouse.

But Johnston’s future is far from certain, and the current political climate and looming possibility of deep safety net program cuts don’t bode well for him.

Johnston was an over-the-road truck driver for many years, but lost his medical card when his blood pressure shot up. Last fall, he was diagnosed with a deteriorating disc, according to medical records he provided to Patch.

“I applied for disability. It was denied. I applied for Medicaid, and it was denied,” he said. “I don’t know what I’m going to do.”

He is working with an attorney to challenge the disability denial, but it may take months to resolve his claim. Johnston says he feels like he’s “caught in a Catch-22.”

He can’t pass the physical to drive a truck. With chronic pain, physical labor jobs that require time away when his condition flares up are out of reach.

“When your back and neck stay tight, you know you can’t do much work,” he said. “What business is going to hire you? How does this not constitute a hardship?”

As he waits for his disability claim to proceed, he has received a disconnect notice from Twin County Electric Power Association for a past-due bill. He was getting energy assistance from a local social services provider, Sunflower-Humphreys Counties Progress Inc., but the organization has changed its policies, Johnston said.

“They’re probably not going to pay the light bill,” Johnston said. “I’m not going to give up my dog. I’m not going to take him to a shelter, where they’re probably going to put him to sleep. That’s not fair.”

Photo courtesy of Edward B. Johnston Jr.