In scores of participating states, including Maryland, low-income families received $40 each month this summer for each eligible school-aged child, up to $120, to buy groceries under the federally funded Sun Bucks program. Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images.
Sarah Moorefield, 40, is a single mother of two teenagers: 15-year-old Izzy and 13-year-old McKenna. Both girls are interested in horseback riding and sporty activities.
Moorefield said it’s difficult to afford groceries for her teenagers on her single income, but it’s particularly hard in the summer when they don’t have access to schools that provide breakfast and lunches throughout the week for her girls and thousands of other families in the state.
“They’re teenagers — I’m telling you, boys or girls, they eat a ton. And I don’t know what it is about summer but I swear they just eat a lot more being at home,” the Queen Anne’s County mother said.
That’s why Moorefield was pleasantly surprised to learn in June that Izzy and McKenna had been automatically enrolled in Sun Bucks, a new federally funded grocery benefit that gave the family an additional $40 per child per month throughout the summer. Because the girls take part in the federal Free and Reduced-Price Meals program during the school year, the family didn’t even apply for Sun Bucks.
From left, Izzy, mom Sarah McKenna Moorefield. Photo courtesy of Sarah Moorefield.
“I just received something in the mail … I was wildly confused,” Moorefield said. “But as I was reading it, I was really excited. It was just like a huge wave of relief knowing that this was upcoming.”
She’s not alone: Final numbers released Thursday by the Department of Human Services show that 586,266 kids received Sun Bucks benefits this summer, surpassing the state’s initial estimate that 543,000 kids would be served.
“We’re simply thrilled at the results,” said Maryland Human Services Secretary Rafael López. “Maryland was leaving a lot of money on the table, especially federal opportunities. Maryland Sun Bucks is a perfect example of that … In this case, over $70 million in grocery-buying benefits for Marylanders in all 24 jurisdictions.”
López called the new Sun Bucks program Maryland’s “single largest investment to end childhood hunger in the summer months.”
Sun Bucks builds off previous state efforts to provide more grocery benefits to lower-income families. Last summer, the state provided $120 in two payments to families in 14 counties — about 90,000 kids. The federal Sun Bucks program allowed the state to expand to all 24 jurisdictions this summer.
“For the Western part of Maryland we saw an astounding 71-fold rise in the number of kids we served,” López said. “We served nearly 51,000 children this summer – whereas last summer, there was only 710 children served.”
“On the Eastern Shore, a nearly tenfold increase. So we served about 36,100 kids” on the Eastern Shore this summer, he added.
The program targets what has been called the “summer hunger gap,” when kids who typically get breakfast and lunch at school no longer have access to those meals in the summer. Families in this situation often find it challenging to pay for those additional meals out of their own pockets.
By the end of August, the state had received a total of $70,589,880 in federal funds for Maryland families, and the state paid $5.8 million in general funds to administer the program. Maryland is one of 37 states and the District of Columbia that opted into the new program for summer 2024, along with five territories and the Cherokee and Chickasaw tribes. The Sun Bucks program is run by the Department of Agriculture’s Food and Nutrition Service.
Qualifying families received a total of $120 per child over the summer, credited to the family’s Electronic Benefits Transfer card that can be used to purchase groceries. In Moorefield’s case, that meant she got $240 this summer, alleviating some of the “astronomical” grocery prices she’s encountered recently.
“It was just really helpful to have this set amount that was coming to me to help out with groceries with the kids being home and eating way more than I’m used to,” she said.
Prince George’s County had the most children in the program, 110,130, and families there received a total of $13 million over the summer. Montgomery and Baltimore counties got more than $10 million each to distribute to qualifying families, while Baltimore City families received a total of $9.2 million in Sun Bucks.
Kent County had the fewest kids in the program, with the 1,697 children enrolled there entitled to $204,080 in grocery benefits.
Most qualifying families were automatically enrolled in Sun Bucks due to their participation in other food assistance or low-income benefit programs: the school lunch program, Temporary Cash Assistance, Medicaid or SNAP – the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. Kids in other situations could qualify, such as a child of a migrant worker, a homeless student, and those in foster care.
López said that automatic enrollment was part of the reason why the final Maryland data overshot initial projections by more than 40,000 kids.
“We do not need to be in the business of making people prove their poverty over and over, when we already know they’re eligible,” he said.
Looking to next year, López said the Department of Human Services wants to reach out to more families that may qualify but did not take part in the Sun Bucks program this year. But in the immediate future, López wants to ensure that every family using Sun Bucks know that they have until Oct. 30 to spend their grocery benefit.
“We can’t solve ending childhood poverty overnight,” he said. “This is one piece of a very important puzzle and a contribution to making sure families get access to what they need.”
Moorefield said the few extra dollars were “extremely helpful” for her family and that there’s “no shame” in needing food assistance programs like free and reduced meals or Sun Bucks.
“I just think it was a huge help, and we were really grateful for it over the summer,” Moorefield said. “I hope it continues and other people have access to it as well.