State plans to hire hundreds of employees to meet federal requirements
By BEN SZALINSKI
Capitol News Illinois
bszalinski@capitolnewsillinois.com
Article Summary
Illinois’ SNAP error rate in federal fiscal year 2025 was 14.7%, which is up from 11.6% the year before.
The state’s error rate is mostly attributed to overpayments of benefits and is four percentage points higher than the national rate. It is also the fifth-highest in the country.
A new federal law requires states with error rates over 10% to pay a greater portion of SNAP benefits beginning as soon as October 2027.
Illinois lawmakers appropriated more than $100 million in the new state fiscal year 2027 budget to pay for higher administrative expenses required by the federal government and hire new staff in hopes of reducing the error rate.
This summary was written by the reporters and editors who worked on this story.
Data released Wednesday by the U.S. Department of Agriculture shows Illinois’ payment error rate for food assistance continues to grow with federal penalties set to take effect in about a year.
The data shows Illinois made errors on 14.7% of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program payments in federal fiscal year 2025. That includes 13.3% of all payments being higher than they should have been.
The error rate is higher than the 11.6% rate of the previous fiscal year. The continuing growth comes as the federal government is set to impose new penalties beginning in October 2027 on states with high error rates on SNAP payments. For Illinois, the penalty could cost about $700 million.
The federal government defines an erroneous payment as one that is $57 higher or lower than it should have been. Only Alaska, Delaware, Georgia, New Mexico, and the District of Columbia had higher error rates than Illinois in FY25.
“Illinois’ SNAP error rate has skyrocketed because of years of mismanagement, and our most vulnerable will be paying the price,” House Republican Leader Tony McCombie, R-Savanna, said in a statement. “This isn’t about taking benefits away from families who legitimately need assistance. It’s about making sure the program is administered properly, and taxpayer dollars are protected. Fraud, waste, and abuse have no place in government.”
Gov. JB Pritzker told reporters at an unrelated event in Chicago on Thursday that the FY25 error rate largely accounts for months in the fiscal year before the president signed the law in July 2025 and doesn’t reflect steps the state has taken to rectify the problem.
“The reality is that when you have an error rate — just want to be clear with everybody — this is not some sort of waste, fraud, and abuse issue,” Pritzker said.
Pritzker claimed the state has lowered the error rate below the FY24 level but was not able to provide a specific number.
Federal changes
Illinois and most other states will have to cover a greater portion of costs for SNAP under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, also known as H.R. 1, based on the state’s error rate.
Beginning in federal fiscal year 2028 that begins in October 2027, many states will begin covering a portion of SNAP benefits. States with an error rate greater than 10% will have to cover 15% of the cost of benefits starting in fiscal year 2029. The delayed implementation gives the state another year to lower its error rate and potentially pay for a smaller portion of the benefits.
States with lower error rates would cover a smaller portion of the benefits and those with an error rate under 6% will not have to cover any benefits. The national error rate is 10.6% and has declined for two straight years.
“They're setting a new bar at 6% and saying, ‘if you can't get to 6%, we're going to take SNAP away or charge you a whole bunch of money,’” Pritzker told reporters last August. “How do they want us to get to 6%? By cutting people off of SNAP.”
Illinois is one of 20 states with an error rate of at least 10%, and the state is expected to pay about $700 million to cover the cost of benefits because of the penalty.
The state FY27 budget signed earlier this month calls for spending $55 million to hire 450 new employees at the Department of Human Services, including to help update the state’s systems to comply with federal changes to SNAP and Medicaid eligibility.
“HR1 is a deliberate effort by the federal government, for the first time, to push the federal food program’s benefits costs on the states, stop customers from receiving SNAP food benefits, and let families go hungry,” DHS spokesperson Rachel Otwell said in an email. “Illinois has launched an aggressive, multi-year effort to improve payment accuracy and protect taxpayers from future fiscal exposure.”
Otwell added that “minor errors” by beneficiaries account for the majority of faulty payments.
DHS plans to implement new technology, increase reviews of people’s eligibility, train more staff to recognize common errors, and improve communication with SNAP recipients about what information they need to report to the state and when.
Also beginning in federal fiscal year 2027, which begins in October 2026, states will have to cover 75% of administrative costs for SNAP, rather than 50%. Illinois lawmakers appropriated $100 million for administrative expenses in state FY27, which begins July 1. That’s up from $60 million in FY26.
The state provided benefits to about 1.5 million people in May, according to the Illinois Department of Human Services. That was about 88,500 fewer people than in April. About 150,000 Illinoisians were expected to lose food assistance benefits beginning May 1 after new work requirements prescribed in H.R. 1 went into effect.
The new state budget established the Families Receiving Emergency Support for Hunger, or FRESH Program, for people who have lost or seen their SNAP benefits reduced. They would be eligible for a one-time $400 payment. The program is scheduled to last just one year and is estimated to cost about $70 million.
Capitol News Illinois is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news service that distributes state government coverage to hundreds of news outlets statewide. It is funded primarily by the Illinois Press Foundation and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation.
