I am an eligibility worker at Halifax Dept of Social Services.  Over the past few years as the economy has gotten worse, our case loads for snap benefits (as well as TANF and Medicaid) have increased by 20 - 30%.  If you change the interim reporting requirements which do NOT require a Face to Face to interview to a Renewal Appointment, it will increase the burden significantly for our already over-loaded eligibility  workers.  Although Renewal appointments can if the client chooses, be done by phone, it still requires specific blocks of time to be set aside for clients to be interviewd by phone or in person (which is still how most are done).  To change from once per year to every 6 months, would double the amount of time we must set aside for renewal appointments which is already tight because we all have approximately 6-7 days per month set aside to see New applicants. 

Currently, we gather much the same infomration under the interim reporting requirements with the advantage that a person does not have to make a specific appointment time and come in to meet with the worker.  This all takes up much valuable time.  Instead, we can process the interim reports as they are mailed back in between our renewal and new applicant appointments.  This, in addition to processing approximately 200 energy assistance applications three times a year as part of our Energy Assistance Programs.

Please do not make this change.