By Brian Lyman | Editor
“It’s not even close to a measure of fraud. It’s when a household circumstance changes, and they do not report that, it ends up becoming a potential error in that case.” - Brandon Hardin, SNAP Director, Alabama Department of Human Resources, on the SNAP error rate
Brandon Hardin, Alabama SNAP Director, speaking at the Department of Human Resources meeting on July 23, 2026, in the Gordon Persons Building in Montgomery, Alabama. (Anna Barrett/Alabama Reflector)
GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS
By Anna Barrett
State officials plan to ask the federal government for a two-year delay on a penalty that could cost the state over $174.3 million. The changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program have led to 80,000 Alabamians losing access to the program. The penalty is based on an error rate that last November amounted to about $4,300 in about $142 million in SNAP benefits.
A room is seen at the Alabama Birth Center in Huntsville, Alabama on Wednesday, April 15, 2026. (Eric Schultz for Alabama Reflector)
HEALTHCARE
By Anna Barrett
A Montgomery County circuit court judge on Sunday said that temporary licenses issued to Alabama’s birth centers — an option between home birth and hospital birth — remained valid despite an appellate court ruling saying the centers were hospitals under a state law and subject to Alabama Department of Public Health regulation. ADPH sent cease and desist letters to the centers last month, saying the licenses were “null and void.”
A person behind bars. (Getty Images)
CRIMINAL JUSTICE
By Ralph Chapoco
A federal judge Thursday ended an 11-year consent decree between the state and the U.S. Department of Justice over Julia Tutwiler Prison for Women in Wetumpka. The state entered the decree in 2015 after the DOJ published a scathing report uncovering sexual abuse and harassment of women incarcerated in the facility. The state and the DOJ had already agreed to terminate 38 of the 44 provisions in the decree in 2024.
ICYMI
Commentary: The Tuberville residency case is a test for the Alabama Supreme Court | Brian Lyman, Alabama Reflector
Alabama Department of Public Health holds hearing on marijuana rescheduling | Andrea Tinker, Alabama Reflector
Alabamian tests positive for measles; no exposure in the state, says ADPH | Newsroom or reporter name
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