Alliance Alert: The Alliance for Rights and Recovery applauds New York State and New York City’s investments in community-based navigators to help people maintain access to critical food, nutrition, and health benefits as federal policy changes threaten to leave millions of New Yorkers without essential supports. These initiatives demonstrate the importance of partnerships between state and local governments and trusted community-based organizations that can reach people where they are and help them navigate increasingly complicated eligibility and enrollment requirements.
As changes to SNAP already result in people losing access to food assistance, and upcoming Medicaid changes threaten health coverage for millions more, we need to see more of these partnerships across New York State. People with mental health and substance use challenges, disabilities, and other barriers to employment and navigating complex benefit systems may be particularly vulnerable to losing services and supports they depend on. No one should lose access to food or health services simply because they did not understand a new requirement, missed a notice, or could not navigate a complicated application or renewal process.
The Alliance urges state and local governments to go further by investing in widespread public education, proactive outreach, and hands-on enrollment and retention assistance. This must include working closely with mental health and substance use providers, peer support organizations, disability advocates, food assistance programs, and other community partners that already have relationships with people who may be most at risk. These organizations can play a critical role in helping individuals understand new rules, identify exemptions, complete necessary paperwork, and maintain their benefits.
Protecting access to food and health services is essential to supporting recovery, stability, and community integration. We commend these initial investments and call on state and local leaders to expand these efforts throughout New York, ensuring that every person affected by federal changes has access to the information and individualized assistance they need before their benefits are disrupted. With millions of New Yorkers potentially affected, we must act now to prevent avoidable losses of coverage and nutrition assistance rather than waiting until people are already in crisis.
New York Pours $26M into SNAP Outreach as Federal Work Rules Shrink Enrollment
By Amanda D’Ambrosio | Crain’s Healthcare | October 13, 2026
New York has issued $26.4 million to expand outreach and enrollment assistance for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP — aiming to help individuals maintain their food benefits amid recent federal work requirements that have led to declining enrollment.
The state’s Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance announced the new funding on Tuesday for the Nutrition Navigators program, which conducts outreach to inform people about SNAP and help them apply. The funds are expected to support outreach and enrollment assistance efforts for roughly 340,000 New Yorkers, according to the office.
The expansion of SNAP outreach comes amid a spate of federal policies that have put New Yorkers at risk of losing their nutrition benefits. The Trump administration has implemented new work requirements for SNAP and reduced federal funding for program administration — both changes that were passed in Congressional Republicans’ 2025 tax law, known as H.R. 1. The work requirements put certain low-income New Yorkers at risk of losing their benefits if they do not comply with requirements to work at least 80 hours per month.
Since federal work requirements took effect in March, SNAP enrollment in New York has declined from 2.7 million to 2.6 million — a reduction of roughly 120,000 fewer enrollees, according to Barbara Guinn, commissioner of the Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance. Not all of those changes can be attributed to the work requirements, as SNAP enrollment was already declining prior to the implementation date, but Guinn said the new rules have led to enrollment declines.
“There have been a lot of changes with the SNAP program over the past year or two,” Guinn said, pointing to H.R. 1. “There’s no time more important than now for us to get information out.”
The Nutrition Navigators program combines and replaces two former SNAP outreach programs: the Nutrition Outreach and Education Program and Targeted SNAP Outreach Program. The new initiative will help with pre-screening, application assistance, general information and assistance with meeting expanded work requirements, according to OTDA.
New York included $8.7 million in the most recent state budget to ramp up SNAP outreach, according to Guinn. The federal government previously provided states 50% of administrative funds for SNAP, but a recent change that took effect this month reduced that contribution to 25%. The state increased its share of funding to make up for that gap, Guinn added.
The state has issued funds to 44 organizations to help with SNAP outreach, including the Food Bank for New York City, the Chinese-American Planning Council, Hunger Free America and others. The state also awarded $4.4 million to the nonprofit Hunger Solutions New York to provide statewide technical assistance and help train navigators.
City Launches Health Benefits Navigators Following New Federal Medicaid and Food Stamp Rules
The city is launching a new outreach team to help New Yorkers stay enrolled in Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program in the face of new federal restrictions passed by Republicans in Washington last year.
Why it matters: President Donald Trump’s signature tax bill, H.R. 1, included new work requirements and other administrative hurdles to access Medicaid and food stamps, which are expected to restrict benefits for hundreds of thousands of residents when they fully take effect in January. On Monday, the Mamdani administration announced the launch of the so-called Health and Affordability Resource Team to work with residents and community-based organizations to maintain public benefits using $3 million in the city budget that was approved earlier this year.