One of Code for America’s major focuses as of late has been GetCalFresh, a free nonprofit service to help eligible Californians apply for the state’s food stamps program. Developers announced last week that they have expanded the breadth of the services’ availability to Sacramento County.
Code for America (CfA), a nonprofit and nonpartisan group, is partnering with the state government to develop GetCalFresh, the initial version of which was built more than two years ago. The platform facilitates easy and mobile access to CalFresh, California’s food assistance program, sometimes known nationally as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). With GetCalFresh, it takes an applicant about eight minutes to apply for the program, a vast improvement over the previous average of 45 minutes.
Adding Sacramento is significant for a few reasons. It brings the total number of California counties using GetCalFresh up to 21 out of a total 58, and while Los Angeles County is not yet eligible, most of the state’s other major population centers are, including San Francisco and San Diego. Sacramento is also a significant add because one of Code for America’s goals in developing GetCalFresh is to make sure that everyone who qualifies for food assistance gets it, and the group estimates that 87,000 Californians in Sacramento County are entitled to help but have not signed up for the program.
Those interested in helping would do well to check CfA’s internal job postings and its list of governmental work.
This article first appeared in Techwire's sister publication Government Technology.
