Bill would add cross checks on food stamps, Medicaid

March 09--COLUMBUS -- State agencies would be forced to cross-check Medicaid and food-stamp recipients against income, employment, lottery, immigration, death, real estate, and other databases on a quarterly basis in an effort to weed out fraud under bills introduced Wednesday.

"We're talking about something that is already being done on an annual basis," said Rep. Robert McColley (R., Napoleon), one of the House bill's sponsors. "What we're really doing is codifying various factors that need to be considered when we are evaluating this."

The Ohio Department of Job and Family Services, which administers these programs, would cross-reference those served by these federal and state programs to determine whether their beneficiaries' eligibility status has changed.

Such changes to look for would include a recipient's death, earning more income than allowed, picking up a job, or winning the lottery.

"These are all basic indicators that would indicate that somebody could possibly be abusing the system," Mr. McColley said. One flag alone probably would not be sufficient to remove someone from the program.

Rep. Michael Henne (R., Clayton) is introducing the House bill. Sen. Bill Coley (R., West Chester) is sponsoring the Senate version.

Roughly 1.5 million Ohioans receive help through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, the federal food-stamp program run by the state. Some 3 million are on Medicaid, the federal-state health insurance for the poor, disabled, and infirm. The bills' sponsors insist that the new requirements are for the state agency overseeing the programs, not the beneficiaries.

Lisa Hamler-Fugitt, head of the Ohio Association of Foodbanks, noted that recipients are required to report changes in their income to the responsible county agencies and must repay benefits to which they weren't entitled.

The proposal comes about a week after the introduction of bills pushed by state Auditor Dave Yost that would require SNAP cards to feature a photo of the primary recipient to discourage the use of such cards as currency to buy drugs.

Contact Jim Provance at: jprovance@theblade.com or 614-221-0496.

Related Items

Robert McColley, Ohio House of Representatives, Jim Provance, food stamp fraud, food stamps, ohio general assembly, Ohio Department of Job and Family Services, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program

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