ANNAPOLIS, Md. — A newly released report from the Office of Legislative Audits found several issues with how Maryland's Department of Human Services distributed benefits to residents.
Auditors revealed the Family Investment Administration (FIA) inadvertently awarded SNAP benefits to ineligible applicants.
An analysis of data from April 2021 showed that 86,479 of the 465,038 Maryland households receiving SNAP benefits had exceeded income limits.
Although it's possible some of those families could have been exempt, such as in the case of being elderly or disabled, eight applications reviewed during the audit were not.
FIA management told investigators they have no intention of pursuing reimbursement from those who were mistakenly paid. The administration cited a now expired USDA memo that temporarily suspended collections efforts.
It's unclear if the USDA, who contributed to those funds during the pandemic, will demand reimbursement from the state. In that case, the FIA could be on the hook to make up for those losses.
So, how did it happen?
Investigators determined that the administration inadvertently disabled a critical system control, within its automated benefits system.
It went unnoticed until March of 2021, when the FIA began implementing its new automated system.
That's not all the audit uncovered.
The FIA also reportedly allowed numerous recipients to continue receiving Temporary Cash Assistance (TCA) benefits, beyond the five years allowed by federal and State regulations.
As of May 2021, FIA records show 3,273 time-lapsed recipients collecting approximately $2.1 million in benefits.
Similar to SNAP eligibility rules, there are exemptions for certain hardships. But investigators say the majority of recipients had no such exemption. One had remained on the rolls for 12-years longer than they were permitted to be, which equated to $150,826 in TCA overpayments. The administration pushed back on some of these findings, contending that most recipients did qualify for exemptions.
Meanwhile, FIA apparently did not always even check whether TCA applicants were already receiving unemployment benefits.
Auditors noted at least two cases in which recipients received $9,613 in unemployment benefits, at the same time they were collecting TCA.
According to FIA records — 26,100 and 11,000 TCA applications were approved during fiscal years 2020 and 2021, respectively.
The audit concluded some of this could have occurred due to the FIA's failure to conduct comprehensive quality assurance reviews of TCA cases to ensure that eligibility determinations and related benefits were proper.
