Alaska is one of only two states that saw increased participation in the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program last year.
The increase in SNAP users could be attributed to changes the state has made to improve access to the federally funded food assistance program, according to the state Department of Health.
The increase comes despite most other states seeing a decline.
A recent study by the nonpartisan Center on Budget and Policy Priorities found that more than 3.5 million people nationwide stopped getting SNAP benefits between the passing of President Trump's Big Beautiful Bill in July 2025 and February 2026.
Alaska had more than 2,500 additional people enroll in the program during that time. Hawaii was the only other state where SNAP participation grew.
As for why participation increased in Alaska, the state Department of Health pointed to investments in modernization aimed at reducing barriers for assistance applicants.
“Alaska has unique economic and geographic challenges, including high food costs, seasonal employment fluctuations, and rural access barriers, which can influence participation differently than national trends,” Health Department spokesperson Mirna Estrada wrote in an email. “Changes in outreach, modernization, processing timeliness, and accessibility may all contribute to increased participation among eligible households.”
The investments include the expansion of online applications and smart form technology, which helps guide the application process and reduce incomplete submissions, Estrada wrote.
The Alaska Division of Public Assistance sits within the Health Department and manages state and federal assistance programs like SNAP. According to the division’s most recent available data, from September, more than 65,000 Alaskans receive food assistance through SNAP.
The division has had issues keeping up with assistance programs after funding and staff cuts, contributing to months-long application backlogs that left thousands without benefits.
Staffing and technology limitations have also contributed to error rates within the state SNAP program. Errors happen when states inaccurately determine SNAP eligibility or benefits.
Nationwide, states have been working to reduce SNAP payment error rates, as the federal government implements financial penalties for error rates exceeding 6%. Although the error rate in Alaska has decreased over the years, it still has had the highest error rate in the nation going back to 2022.
States with error rates above 13% in 2025 won’t face cost-sharing requirements until 2029. In 2024, Alaska had an error rate of 22%.
Gov. Mike Dunleavy has allocated tens of millions of dollars since 2023 to address modernization within the Division of Public Assistance, the Alaska Beacon reported.
“Investments in staffing, contracted support, workflow modernization, interview scheduling improvements, and document management technology have all been part of a broader effort to process applications more efficiently and connect eligible Alaskans to benefits faster,” Estrada wrote.
The state Health Department also recently announced a new feature on the Alaska Connect Portal. Alaskans can apply for multiple public assistance programs on their phones, which the department expects will reduce unnecessary paperwork and help modernize the application process.
Still, the new service has created barriers, said Magen James, SNAP outreach manager with the Food Bank of Alaska. The change has been confusing for applicants who don’t have email addresses, and it does not address the root of the state’s problems, she said.
“Their new portal that they've launched for neighbors, that's not the system that they're using to make eligibility decisions with,” she said, noting that the system for eligibility decisions was created in 1976. “If they put as much progress on the backend as they did the frontend, they'd be in a lot better position.”
Until then, James said, “forget about it.”
According to the Department of Health, the end goal is to make it easier for Alaskans to apply for and manage their benefits, while also improving tools for staff so applications and renewals can be processed more efficiently.
To those ends, projects currently underway include updates to notices, making it easier for applicants to understand eligibility requirements, and implementing a virtual assistant for staff to improve decision consistency.
With changes at the federal level, James said, the food bank and the Health Department are just trying to keep up with all the new policies.
“They're being hit from every which way, in addition to their internal struggles to keep everything filled,” she said. “So it's just one fire at a time.”
