Iowa to participate in Summer EBT in 2026 after state program reached far fewer children

DES MOINES — Iowa announced on Monday that it will return to a federal summer food assistance program, while tying the program’s $40 per month per child to Iowa’s new healthy foods initiative.

The announcement came on the same day a report made available to The Gazette showed Iowa’s program in 2025 fell well short of reaching the number of children that the federal program would have.

Gov. Kim Reynolds said the state will participate in the federal Summer EBT program, also known as SUN Bucks, which will provide families with $120 over three months, or $40 per month per child, on pre-loaded electronic benefit transfer cards to purchase food during summer break.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture approved the state’s waiver to align Summer EBT with Iowa’s “Healthy SNAP” program set to go into effect Jan. 1, which bars benefit recipients from using the funds for certain grocery items, including soda and sweets.

Last summer, the state opted out of the federal program and received a USDA waiver to establish the “Healthy Kids Iowa” pilot program, which provided low-income families with $40 worth of “fresh and nutritious food” in pre-made boxes that were made available to pick up at several meal sites across the state.

The boxes included things like frozen beef or turkey, cans of tuna, Nutri-Grain bars, frozen hash browns, fruit cups, cereal bowls, juice boxes, shelf stable milk, eggs, string cheese, apples and canned soup.

From June through August, 66,786 unique children received food packages through Healthy Kids Iowa, according to a state report provided to The Gazette by HHS on Monday.

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That number is less than a third of the estimated 220,000 Iowa children who will be eligible for federal Summer EBT benefits in 2026, according to a state waiver request to the federal administration.

At the time, Reynolds cited the state’s childhood obesity rates as her reasoning behind rejecting the federal funds, arguing that the food boxes were a healthier alternative to EBT cards.

But as the program was rolled out, food banks and anti-hunger advocates expressed concern that the program would reach significantly fewer kids than Summer EBT would have, especially those in rural areas of the state who struggle to reach summer feeding sites and food programs due to geography or work schedules.

In a press release Monday, Reynolds said the new program will provide “healthy food plus convenience” for Iowa children and families after food banks and pantries faced hurdles with the program in 2025.

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“Food assistance programs that are nutrition-focused do more to help low-income Iowans by addressing both hunger and health,” Reynolds said in a statement Monday. “The SUN Bucks program has lacked a focus on nutrition, which was the reason we launched the Healthy Kids Iowa pilot program last summer. The response to the healthy, fresh foods that were available for families was overwhelmingly positive, but operating the program was challenging for some food banks and pantries.”

Iowa first opted out of Summer EBT in 2024 alongside 13 other states, rejecting $29 million in federal food assistance funding for an estimated 240,000 children in the state. The state would have had to pay roughly $2.2 million to administer the program.

Next year’s Summer EBT eligibility will be based on household income and participation in SNAP or whether families qualify for free and reduced price meals through the National School Lunch and Breakfast programs. Most eligible children for next summer’s program will be automatically enrolled and those who aren’t may still qualify based on household income and other requirements, according to the governor’s office.

Further information about eligibility and program enrollment will be available on the Iowa Health and Human Services website in early 2026.

“We are committed to supporting Iowa families and ensuring children have access to healthy meals year-round,” Iowa HHS Director Larry Johnson said in a statement. “Joining SUN Bucks allows us to expand our reach and provide families with flexibility in how they meet their nutritional needs.”

Advocates ‘ecstatic’ about next year’s changes

Iowa’s Save the Children Action Network manager and Iowa Hunger Coalition board member Paige Chickering said the state’s anti-hunger advocates are “ecstatic” that Iowa is opting into next year’s Summer EBT program, noting that it will likely reach significantly more children compared to last summer’s pilot program.

In November, Chickering and other anti-hunger advocates delivered a petition with more than 650 signatures to the governor’s office, urging the state to opt back into Summer EBT. Chickering said that Healthy Kids Iowa created more barriers for families that couldn’t make it to meal sites in the hours they were open and put extra strain on food banks that struggled to meet demand and adopt the program quickly after it was announced.

Chickering said she heard from food bank volunteers who felt like helping out with last summer’s program was a “second job.”

“It was a really big lift for them (food banks) …they were happy to have the opportunity to do so, but it was very challenging from a logistics perspective,” Chickering said. “One of the really phenomenal things about Summer EBT, and why we've been advocating so strongly for the use of that program, is because the access barriers just really melt away when you're able to send an EBT card directly to families.”

Report: Families and food banks prefer Summer EBT

To analyze Healthy Kids Iowa’s impact, Iowa HHS contracted with Altarum Institute. The nonprofit health care research organization collected data, surveyed roughly 1,000 participants and separately gathered feedback from food banks and distribution sites. The report summarizes the organization’s findings.

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Iowa was awarded $9.1 million from USDA to operate Healthy Kids Iowa, a fraction of the estimated $29 million the state would have received had it participated in Summer EBT. The state set a targeted reach of serving 65,000 children through Healthy Kids Iowa, which was roughly 32 percent of the overall eligible population. The state arrived at the target number “based on utilization experience from other programs,” the report said.

Healthy Kids Iowa served 34,879 children in June, 47,543 in July and 43,157 in August, according to the report, or 54 percent, 73 percent and 66 percent of the stated program goals.

Those numbers are roughly 16 percent, 22 percent and 20 percent of the total number of Iowa children eligible for Summer EBT.

While the families who participated in Healthy Kids Iowa reported positive comments about the program, they also said they prefer Summer EBT, according to the state report.

The sentiment was shared by Iowa food banks, which also preferred Summer EBT, the state report said.

When both programs were described, 57 percent of families surveyed said they would prefer Summer EBT, compared to just 25 percent who preferred Healthy Kids Iowa, according to the state report. Nineteen percent said they had no preference.

Of the survey respondents who provided a written response for the reason they preferred Summer EBT, 56 percent said “choice in food selection,” according to the state report. Another 23 percent said “better variety and quality of food,” and 18 percent said “convenience and accessibility.”

The report said “many” survey respondents from food banks and food distribution sites also recommended using Summer EBT or “similar alternatives” in the future, the report said. Food banks said the program increased community engagement, but caused logistic and financial strain, according to the report.

For the families that did participate in Healthy Kids Iowa, the program received largely positive marks in the survey. Of the respondents:

Download: Healthy Kids Iowa Report.pdf

Comments: (515) 355-1300, erin.murphy@thegazette.com

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