Disaster Food Stamps: A Disaster

(Our personal Albany Park flood story, complete with pictures, starts at
Albany Park Flood: Record-Breaking Chicago Rains. )

I had heard recently that Disaster Food Stamps were available for the victims of the Chicago River Albany Park flood. Unfortunately, I had heard that the last date to apply had been yesterday, Friday, October 17, 2008, which didn't give victims much time to respond. I finally managed to get over to a State of Illinois Community Service Center in Skokie, near Oakton and Central Park. (Note: The deadline to apply for Disaster Food Stamps has been extended, as I describe in the next entry at Albany Park Flood victims can still get disaster food stamps. )

I got there around 3 p.m. and there was no place to park. The parking lot was full; people were double-parked, sitting in their cars waiting for spaces to open up, parking on the grass, parking illegally... quite a mess. I finally parked on the street a block away.

I went into the building but initially didn't see any rhyme or reason to the hordes of people milling around, nor did I see any "direction" desk such as one finds at the Secretary of State's Office. I walked to the front, no direction there, then walked back. I then saw a security desk and I asked where to sign up for disaster food stamps. I was pointed to a very long, slow-moving line. Standing in this long, slow-moving line was the first step.

Standing in line was quite a revelation. I heard people discussing what they should tell the intake people in order to get the Disaster Food Stamps. "Tell them you lost your shoes and your clothes," said one woman to a man who didn't seem to have any legitimate reason for getting disaster food stamps. "Tell them that you didn't have any electricity and you had to throw out all of your food," said somebody else. "Just write down that you have six people in your house. I don't think they check," said a different woman. It's very difficult to stand in a line when you have a legitimate reason to get some kind of aid and overhear people simply taking advantage of the system. It's not surprising, but it is one thing to hear about it on the news, and another to listen to people standing just a few feet away who are actively making plans to abuse the system.

After about half an hour I came to the front of the line. My name was placed on a list and I received a form to fill out. It was at this time that the woman at the desk announced that the deadline had been extended until next Wednesday, October 22nd. Great, I thought, I'll take my form, fill it out at home and come back next week. No such luck... People can't take the form with them; if you leave and come back, you need to get back into the slow-moving line and start from scratch. Since I already had half an hour invested, I decided to stay.

I filled out the form, not a very lengthy or difficult form, turned it in, found a chair and waited. And waited. It was after 4 by the time I turned in my form, and at 5 p.m., the scheduled closing time, employees started putting on their coats and leaving via the rear doors. But we were told that the center would stay open and we would all be seen. There were about a hundred people waiting at this point.

I couldn't remember much about the people in line in front of me.. I figured if I could remember one or two people who were in line ahead of me, and if I saw them get called, I would know that my turn was soon. But I kept looking around, I kept waiting. Eventually it was 6 p.m.

Then I saw a woman in a distinctive white sweater get called, and I became hopeful. I remembered that woman's white sweater... she was a few people ahead of me. I would be called soon!

I was right... about ten minutes later it was my turn. The young woman caseworker subtracted the amount of the damage and loss from the amount of our income and available cash for the month, and we clearly met the guidelines for Disaster Food Stamps. I signed various forms and then waited while the woman entered my name into the system. Then, as we don't have LINK cards (the Illinois food stamp card), I needed to go back out to the waiting area and wait while our LINK card was enabled. Finally, at about 7 p.m., I was done and out.

It's too bad that we couldn't get these food stamps when we really needed them, back about three weeks ago, when we used up all of our ready cash with the down payment on the furnace/hot water heater, the dehumidifier and a few other things. But I'd had two big garbage bags full of food that I had thrown out.. I'm happy to have some assistance right now.

So, even though the process is daunting and time-consuming, it is probably worth it. Most of us have paid our taxes faithfully for years... If you need to use some of these services, it's good that they are available. But it is frustrating to realize how many people abuse these services. Nothing I can do about that, however.

Due to the large volume of people and the short period of time, waiting for Disaster Food Stamps was a disaster itself. But, for us and for other victims of the Albany Park Flood, it was worth the wait.

(The Albany Park flood home page is at Albany Park flood blog: One family's experience. )

(Next part of the Albany Park Flood Story: Deadline for Disaster Food Stamps Extended. )