As one in five Louisiana families lose SNAP, N.O. schools brace for free lunch impact

Many New Orleans students may lose free meals at schools in the coming years due to drastic cuts to federal funding for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), also known as food stamps.

In July 2025, federal legislation changed food-stamp eligibility through the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which will reduce SNAP funding by about $186 billion over the next decade by limiting non-citizen enrollment and requiring an expanded number of able-bodied SNAP recipients to work at least 20 hours a week.

In May 2025, before the bill went into effect, more than 800,000 Louisiana residents received SNAP benefits. While enrollment nationally dropped 13% in subsequent months, it dropped even more steeply in Louisiana. By this July, one year after the bill was enacted, only about 631,000 Louisianians were enrolled in SNAP — a reduction of roughly 21%.

The reduction to SNAP funding comes at a time of heightened hunger across the country and in Louisiana. Second Harvest, a food bank that serves Southern Louisiana communities, has seen more demand but receives less and less food over the past few years. Invest Louisiana, a nonpartisan think tank, found that the new requirements create more administrative paperwork for those who need SNAP, which complicates the enrollment process and has ultimately reduced enrollment even for eligible families, according to Invest Louisiana analyst Tia Fields.

Children of families enrolled in SNAP are automatically eligible for free school meals, according to Elizabeth Cowles Johnston, a spokesperson for the School Nutrition Association. The association is concerned about the coming impact of SNAP funding cuts on the accessibility of free school meals, she wrote in a statement to The Lens. 

For years, school-cafeteria directors across the nation had file drawers filled with parental paystubs and proof of income. Then, in 2010, Congress passed legislation creating the Community Eligibility Program (CEP), a government-funded program that provides free meals to an entire school when a high percentage of students qualify for free meals. 

The vast majority of NOLA Public Schools participate in the program.

But when families lose access to SNAP, they have to apply for free school lunches, and must be approved by their school. And a school’s ability to stay in CEP depends on the percentage of its students who are directly certified for free meals. So when fewer students automatically qualify for free school meals, schools are less likely to stay in CEP, Cowles Johnston said. 

The families who will likely be most impacted, she said, are those who attend schools that don’t participate in CEP. 

“Losing direct certification means they automatically need to apply for benefits or start paying for meals,” Cowles Johnston wrote. “Many families whose income exceeds eligibility limits for free or reduced-price meals still struggle to afford school meal prices.”

Fewer New Orleans students automatically qualify for free meals

Tess Bradford, the chief executive officer of the food service consultant company School Food Solutions, which works with FirstLine Schools and several other charter networks and schools in New Orleans, said her company has noticed a small decrease in the number of students who automatically qualify for free school meals since the One Big Beautiful Bill Act was passed.

But Bradford said she’s not too concerned yet.

“Most of the schools in New Orleans, their CEP percentages are high enough that they could take a pretty good hit and still” qualify for universal free meals, Bradford said.

SNAP funding cuts, she said, will disproportionately affect schools with more diverse socioeconomic populations, which might not qualify for CEP, or qualify by a smaller margin.

About one in five New Orleans residents receive SNAP benefits, and children are the most likely demographic to experience food insecurity, according to a 2024 report from the City of New Orleans.

Last school year, 82% of students attending NOLA Public Schools were “economically disadvantaged,” according to the district’s website, meaning they qualified for free meals. Because of the district’s high CEP enrollment rate, it’s likely that even more students received free meals. 

NOLA Public Schools spokesperson Taslin Alfonzo did not respond to requests for comment from The Lens.

Last school year, nearly 656,000 Louisiana students received free meals at school, according to Ted Beasley, a spokesperson for the Louisiana Department of Education. 

The state will not know the impact of SNAP funding cuts until it conducts its annual eligibility count April 1, 2027, Beasley said. CEP operates on a four-year cycle, he said, so there will likely be a delay in changes to which schools are enrolled in the program.