(The Center Square) – As the federal government reopens after Congress passed a temporary funding package, federally funded programs, from food stamps to airport security, are starting to come back to full service.
Head Start programs that were facing a funding shortfall have, for the most part, been able to keep their doors open, Head Start officials said. Air traffic controllers who were working without pay started receiving back pay on Friday, Federal Aviation Administration officials told The Center Square. State officials said they expect food stamp, or CalFresh, recipients will get their full November benefits.
“Reopening the government will restore stability for our military and federal law enforcement, return air travel to normal, improve public safety operations, and ensure families and businesses can rely on the government services they depend on and pay for through their taxes,” said U.S. Rep. Jay Obernolte, R-Hesperia, in an e-newsletter sent out on Monday.
After the federal government reopened following the longest-ever shutdown at 43 days, federally funded services and programs started to once again expect that regular funding would come down the pike soon. But federal officials warned that reinstatement of funding would happen slowly.
According to the Congressional Budget Office, the six-week-long federal government shutdown was expected to reduce the gross domestic product growth in the fourth quarter by 1.5 percentage points at an annual rate. The economy would lose about $11 billion by the end of 2026 because of the six-week shutdown, the office said.
During the federal government shutdown, those who relied on the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, known as CalFresh in California, saw their benefits dry up as funding for the low-income food assistance program ran out of money. With the funding resolution passed in Congress, CalFresh beneficiaries will once again be able to use electronic benefit transfer (EBT) cards to buy groceries this month.
“CalFresh/SNAP benefits were delayed due to the Trump Administration’s decision to oppose the issuance of benefits during the shutdown,” said Jason Montiel, public affairs and outreach programs spokesman.
“However, the federal shutdown is over. We anticipate that all recipients should be receiving full SNAP benefits in November and the coming months,” Montiel wrote in an email to The Center Square.
Other federally-funded programs are still waiting for regular funding to come through. Head Start, which provides child care, early childhood education and other services, faced the prospect of closing the doors of locations across the country during the government shutdown. One California site did close in recent weeks because of the lack of federal funding, Head Start officials told The Center Square.
“Fortunately, California had just one Head Start program that closed its doors during the shutdown, Encompass Community Services in the Santa Cruz area,” wrote Melanee Cottrill, executive director of Head Start California, in an email to The Center Square. “Unfortunately, that program has not yet seen funding come through. We are hopeful that the Office of Head Start will have funding processed before Thanksgiving. It may take some time after that for the program to get its doors open again.”
An official from the Federal Aviation Administration responded to an email inquiry from The Center Square on Tuesday. The official said air traffic controllers, who are federal employees who worked without pay at airports across the country during the government shutdown, started to receive back pay on Friday. However, officials from the Transportation Security Administration and officials at San Francisco International Airport and Los Angeles International Airport, two of California’s busiest airports, did not respond to The Center Square’s requests for comment.
The federal government shutdown started after Democratic and Republican members of the House and Senate failed to come to an agreement on whether to include an extension of pandemic-era subsidies on health insurance policies in a temporary funding resolution. The failure to pass a funding resolution to keep the federal government open through the end of the year led to the lack of funds to pay workers and cover regular operations at federal departments and programs.
“This was not a perfect deal,” wrote U.S. Rep. Adam Gray, D-Merced, in an e-newsletter sent on Friday. “But it gets assistance to the 47,000 families in our community who rely on food stamp benefits. No parent should have to choose between feeding their children and keeping the lights on because someone in Washington thinks chaos is a negotiating tactic.”
