Washington, DC - On Monday, December 4, 2023, Councilmember Christina Henderson is holding a joint oversight roundtable with the Committee on Health and the Committee on Housing to discuss why thousands of District residents’ public benefits applications are not being processed in a timely manner. The Department of Human Services (DHS), the Department of Health Care Finance (DHCF), and the Deputy Mayor for Health and Human Services will be in attendance.

The District has faced significant challenges when determining residents’ eligibility for health and human services benefits, despite spending more than $622 million on the DC Access System (DCAS) that was supposed to streamline the enrollment process. DCAS is intended to ensure streamlined and timely processing of Medicaid, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, formerly food stamps), the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), DC Healthcare Alliance, and the Immigrant Children’s Program. Given the outcomes, DCAS is clearly not working as intended:

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Failure to Process SNAP Applications in a Timely Manner:

• The District ranked last nationally for timely processing of SNAP applications in Fiscal Year 2022 with a rate of just 42.86% (the second worst performer was Guam at 65.93%);
• For the first half of Fiscal Year 2023, the District’s timely processing rate for SNAP was 55.65%. However, in February 2023, the rate was 11.34%;
• The District previously faced a lawsuit in 2017 because of its failure to timely process SNAP applications due to a timely processing rate of 86.34%—more than double the Fiscal Year 2022 rate (a proposed settlement for the lawsuit is available here);
• The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) issued an advance warning letter to the District in April 2023, regarding SNAP enrollment and rejected the District’s proposed corrective action plan because it did not fully address the cited requirements and would take too much time to complete; and
• USDA FNS warned that if the District did not improve timely application processing, FNS may issue a formal warning that federal funds for SNAP could be suspended.

Failure to Process Medicaid Renewals in a Timely Manner:

• At the same time, there are 18,599 Medicaid renewal applications pending review as of November 20;
• As of October 23, 43% of pending Medicaid renewal applications (more than 6,900 applications), were pending review for more than 60 days. 27% of renewal applications (more than 4,300), were pending review for more than 90 days;
• The Committee on Health has received reports that residents are losing their benefits while their Medicaid renewal applications are pending due to DCAS user error, even though Medicaid policy require that residents maintain coverage once they have submitted all required materials; and
• The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services sent an August 2023 letter to DHCF citing concerns with the District’s application processing times.

DCAS was intended to create a streamlined, efficient system to connect District residents with health and human services benefits. However, cumbersome applications, lengthy application processing times, and high rates of user error persist. When asked during FY 2024 Budget Oversight if DCAS was working as intended, Deputy Mayor Wayne Turnage replied with an emphatic “no”. Councilmember Henderson agrees. The DCAS program, in conjunction with DHS application processing, is failing. Monday’s roundtable is intended to uncover the root causes and potential solutions to these challenges.

The oversight roundtable is scheduled for Monday, December 4, 2023, at 10:00 am in Room 500 of the John A. Wilson Building. This is the third hearing that the Committee on Health has held on Medicaid renewals this year. Additional information about the hearing, written testimony, and access to the video broadcast of the hearing can be found at https://lims.dccouncil.gov/Hearings/hearings/189.

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