Thirty Tennessee county mayors have signed a letter urging Gov. Bill Lee to reinstate Summer EBT, a federal food assistance program for school-aged children, before the Dec. 31 deadline.
The program provided roughly $120 per child for the summer to help families buy food while school is out. It served approximately 700,000 Tennessee children in 2024 before Lee opted out in December 2024.
“Tennessee’s reversal on Summer EBT this past summer was a hit to families trying to afford food,” said Signe Anderson, the Tennessee Justice Center’s Senior Director of Nutrition Advocacy. “Families were also hit in November when SNAP benefits were blocked from reaching food insecure households.”
The 30 counties represented in the letter include Bedford, Campbell, Cannon, Chester, Claiborne, Clay, Coffee, Crockett, Dyer, Franklin, Gibson, Hancock, Hardeman, Hawkins, Jackson, Jefferson, Lewis, Lincoln, Marion, Marshall, Maury, Moore, Morgan, Pickett, Polk, Rhea, Smith, Stewart, White and Wilson.
A spokesperson for Lee’s office told News 2 last December the state declined to renew participation because of shifting costs and program duplication.
“The Summer EBT program was established in the pandemic-era to supplement existing food assistance programs in an extraordinary circumstance,” the spokesperson said. “The federal government has increasingly shifted the administrative cost burden to the states, prompting Tennessee not to renew our participation, as the program is mostly duplicative.”
Tennessee replaced Summer EBT with its own Summer Nutrition Initiative in 2025, which provided a one-time $120 payment to eligible families in 15 counties with limited access to summer meal sites.
That state-funded program served children ages 5-18 enrolled in SNAP or TANF in Benton, Carroll, Carter, Cocke, Fayette, Grainger, Houston, Humphreys, Johnson, Lauderdale, Marshall, Moore, Rhea, Sequatchie and Sumner counties.
The Tennessee Justice Center, which organized the mayors’ letter, continues advocating for the federal program’s return.
“Now is the time for Governor Lee and the state to bring back Summer EBT, which would put food in the homes of families who need it,” Anderson said. “Every resource should be made available to support families and the economy.”
