Wisconsin DHS Asks State Legislature to Approve Nearly $70 million for SNAP Services

Wednesday, October 15th, 2025 -- 11:01 AM

(WMTV) The Wisconsin Department of Health Services is requesting the state legislature to approve nearly $70 million in new funding to keep SNAP or food share services running.

President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act reduced federal funding support for state SNAP benefits. Starting this fall, states must cover 75% of SNAP administrative costs, up from 50%.

The bill also creates work requirements to qualify for food stamps, which generates additional paperwork for DHS to process. Approximately 700,000 people currently use SNAP benefits in the state, according to Jackie Anderson, executive director of Feeding Wisconsin.

Under the new work eligibility requirements, an estimated 43,000 of those recipients will need to complete additional paperwork, Anderson said. “That’s why it’s really, really important that we’ve got the staffing structure, that we’ve got this good systems in place maintained,” Anderson said.

The state funds would be used to cover federal cuts in SNAP funding, hire 56 new DHS staff members to handle increased eligibility paperwork and provide job training services for Wisconsinites receiving food stamps. Currently, only 4% of SNAP benefit applications contain errors, such as misspelled addresses or other minor mistakes.

However, if Wisconsin’s error rate increases to 6% while processing the additional paperwork, the federal government could impose fines of up to $200 million annually on the state, according to DHS.

“If we don’t invest now and keep our error rate low, it’s going to be detrimental,” Anderson said.

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