COLUMBIA — South Carolinians who missed out on their grocery assistance for November should receive their benefits Friday, according to the state Department of Social Services.
More than 176,000 households in the state didn’t get their food benefits this month because of a 43-day federal shutdown that ended late Wednesday night. After funding to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program stopped Nov. 1, states scrambled to figure out how to feed millions of low-income people who usually rely on the benefits, commonly called food stamps.
Because South Carolina distributes SNAP benefits on a rolling basis, the shutdown didn’t block aid to all of the nearly 550,000 people the program helps feed.
For the roughly 64,700 households who usually get their benefits between the 15th and the 19th of each month, money to their debit cards will be downloaded on their usual schedule, DSS said in a Thursday news release.
Everyone else in the program, including those newly approved for benefits after Oct. 15, should get their November allotment Friday. Altogether, around $105 million in benefits are downloaded onto cards each month, according to DSS.
The law President Donald Trump signed Wednesday ending the shutdown included funding for the program through Sept. 30, 2026.
Until all SNAP recipients have received their benefits, the state’s donation-supported emergency response fund will continue to accept money, said Georgia Mjartan, president of Central Carolina Community Foundation, which runs the One SC Fund. Gov. Henry McMaster announced the fund’s activation Oct. 28, ahead of the looming Nov. 1 shutdown, to help food banks stock their shelves.
“The need is still there, because people don’t actually have SNAP loaded back onto their cards yet,” Mjartan said Thursday. “It’s not just a snap of the fingers and then their funds are available.”
Since its activation Oct. 28, the fund collected $326,654 from 680 separate donors, Mjartan said. With several more large donations incoming, Mjartan expects the fund to reach $400,000 by early next week at the latest, she said.
The fund sent an initial $200,000 last week to four regional food banks with reach across the state. With SNAP benefits returning, the fund will distribute the rest of the money raised.
Although donations fell far short of the millions of dollars officials hoped to see, the fund received money from a record-breaking number of donors, Mjartan said.
Among them were children who wrote that they were donating their allowances to keep fellow children from going hungry, elderly couples scraping together what they could to help out, and some recurring donors who gave more than $10,000, she said.
“It’s been really overwhelming to see how individuals really responded to this very human need of their neighbors, and that has been one of the brightest spots,” Mjartan said.
Unlike after natural disasters, companies and foundations were more hesitant to donate, seemingly out of fear their money wouldn’t make a major difference, Mjartan said.
The fund did get $100,000 from Duke Energy soon after activating, as well as more than $50,000 from WoodmenLife Outreach Foundation, the philanthropic arm of an insurance company. Several more companies said they would make donations in the coming days, she said.
More companies and people likely found other ways to help, such as donating to local organizations feeding people or running food drives, Mjartan said.
She encouraged everyone to do whatever they could, whether donating to the statewide relief fund or giving a neighbor something to eat. Restaurants across the state also helped out by offering free meals.
“The fact that that particular fund didn’t fill up with contributions of $5 million, $6 million like we hoped does not mean millions of dollars did not go to organizations doing that on-the-ground food work,” Mjartan said.
Although the emergency feeding fund will wrap up in the coming days, the general One SC Fund remains open year-round, Mjartan said. Any money donated to the general fund and not a specific cause goes toward helping when an emergency happens, so the fund can get money to people as quickly as possible, she said.
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