Navigating red tape: An Oklahoman shares his story about difficulties applying for public assistance programs managed by state agencies | Oklahoma House Interim Study | Oct. 8, 2025

Making applications for public assistance easier and more user-friendly is important for both the Oklahomans who need help and the state agencies that coordinate it. When the process is simple and clear, more families can get the support they need without getting stuck in confusing paperwork or long wait times.

In spring 2025, lawmakers approved a feasibility study (House Bill 1575) about creating a unified eligibility and application process for public assistance administered by state agencies. The Oklahoma House Committee on Children, Youth and Family Services held an Oct. 8, 2025, interim study to discuss best practices in this effort, as well as hear from Oklahomans about how the current system is ineffective and needlessly cumbersome.

During the study, lawmakers heard directly from Bruce Gros of Tulsa, who shared his story about his experiences in applying and re-applying for public services. The following is a transcript of his comments. The full video of the interim study – IS-25-054, HB 1575 Implementation (Rep. Pae and Gise) – can be viewed at the Oklahoma House website.

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My name is Bruce Gros, and I would like to first thank Representative Pae, Representative Gise, and Chairman Williams for the opportunity to be here. For the Oklahoma Policy Institute and Hunger Free Oklahoma for facilitating my appearance today. I am the human, yes, face of the end user. I am a 64-year-old veteran, senior, and disabled.

In my background, prior to my disability, I worked for 40 some years in various aspects. As a youth in restaurants, in adulthood as a seminarian for the Diocese of Tulsa, and then in church service. And later, after I left the ministry field, in real estate for many years. In 1999, I contracted an immuno-compromising disease that affected my health tremendously.

It effectively kept me from being able to move, more or less, for about six weeks. And it took me about 18 months to recover from that to the point where I was able to function properly and return to work. A result of that was I lost my house, I lost my car, I lost all of my personal property, and I had to start over from basically nothing.

At that time, I could have gone on disability rather easily, but I thought, you know, I’m young-ish. I have lots of life ahead of me. I’m recovering. And so I returned to the workforce. I was able to do that for another 15 years until about 2015, when my health again started to decline and it continuously declined over that period.

And I’ll tell you exactly why. Because I was in that space between the Affordable Care Act subsidies and where you can afford health care. I was making about $40,000 a year, and health care for me started at $17,000 for premiums, plus $750 a month for the one medication I had to have, plus anything else. And I think you can see the mathematics of that simply doesn’t work, unfortunately.

By 2017, I was permanently disabled. And again I lost my home, kept my car, lost all of my permanent personal property, lost all of my assets and had to start again. I returned to Oklahoma, where I have family. And, in July of 2019, I started accessing services through Health and Human Services.

Started with SNAP. And here’s how that worked for me. I went in about 8:30 to the facility at 36th Street North and Peoria. I had my paperwork in order because I had studied up ahead of time, brought it all in, got to meet with a worker right then and there. They processed my application on the spot, issued me a card, and it was loaded within 30 minutes.

And I thought that was a fantastic job. So kudos to HHS for that. And I will tell you, if all of my experiences were as good as that, we’d have no need to discuss anything today.

But as you well know, and I will say that Mr. Hope highlighted quite well, the resources that are available for applying and maintaining your benefits are little antiquated. They are confusing. They’re difficult to use. They are bothered by a myriad of dates, of requirements, and what you’re needing to do when you have to do it, and for whom you have to do it. The conversation between the Oklahoma Health Care Authority and (Health and) Human Services, I’m in that mix because with being on SSI and disabled, that’s where I get my “you pay for it, you provide it.”

And that literally means that I have to talk to both of you sometimes in order to have something resolved. And even then, I still don’t get to the one person who knows the right answer. So, in addition to receiving SNAP, I received in late 2020 a favorable determination for SSI, which was a godsend because up to then I literally had zero – zero – income.

I provided you guys my actual personal budget, and I’ll touch on that at the end a little bit. But I encourage you to kind of glance at while I’m talking here. With SSI, that meant that automatically I started receiving health care coverage under that particular title of Medicaid. I will say that previous to that when the expansion came, I was able to get health care through the expansion for about a year and a half before I got the determination.

I also receive, sometimes, LIHEAP assistance. And I will tell you that information on this is difficult. I did not know, and the information was not readily available to me to know, that I was eligible for it and how to apply for it. The first time I applied for it, got it – great. That was in the winter time.

I did not know that you could also receive it in the summertime. I did not know that if you change your address, you have to reapply from the beginning. I did not know that if you’re in the same place and your apartment manager changes your address, you have to reapply and start all over again. This means that I lost or missed the opportunity to have that assistance several times.

And if you had glanced briefly at that budget, you’ll notice that the number on the top and the number on the bottom exactly match. That’s purely coincidental. But it exactly matches. If I miss something, something else has to be given up for me to cover it. Simple as that.

So I’m delighted to know in here, not only are you studying the feasibility, but it sounds like you’re well down the road of agreeing that it’s not only feasible, but necessary and desirable. And I’m hopeful that that’s the end result of this feasibility study.

I would like to point out some other particular barriers. As I mentioned, each one of these programs has its own time frame for when you apply or reapply. It has its own basis of what’s the financial barrier, what’s the financial threshold, has its own requirements regarding this, what particular things you need to supply.

If those things could be unified, it would certainly serve me as an end user in the public because it would make my life much simpler. The likelihood of my missing my benefit from some error on my part, is a real fear for me and for many people in my situation.

Number one, we can’t afford it.

And number two, there’s lots of reasons why that might occur when you’re disabled, you don’t always feel good. When you don’t feel good or you have high pain, your mental health suffers from it. Some days, you just reached your capacity on what you can do – and even though you know you have to get to that thing right there – you can’t get to it right now.

And that causes you to miss deadlines and deadlines cause you to miss benefits. That means that you have to start all over again. One such instance occurred to me earlier this year. I had a lapse in my SNAP benefits because I didn’t do my part. Then in June, on the 18th of June, I resubmitted that information through DHS Live, and it was complete.

And at that time, it said, yep, someone will process it and we will let you know if we need an interview. Well, I never heard whether I needed an interview on it. So I double checked on DHS Live two times to check the status of it – both times “pending.”

On the 30th of June, I called the very first thing in the morning on the telephone number, and was in the queue, and it promised me it said, you know, was going to be like a four-hour wait or something like that. Two-hour wait or a four-hour wait – something ridiculously long.

It was the last business day of the month, I admit that it’s not the best day. But it did say you have the opportunity to be in the queue and have a callback. Twice in my experience, I’ve asked for that callback and it never occurred. On this particular occasion, I did not receive that callback. I never received a callback.

What happened was about the 10th of July, I received a letter that said on the 1st of July – not the 30th of June – on the 1st of July that it approved my benefits. What that meant was for the month of June, I got no SNAP allotment because it was past the deadline; and it’s based on the date that it’s approved, not on the date you apply.

So far, different from my original experience back in 2017 when I got my first SNAP allotment within 30 minutes.

I would also say that, as an SSI recipient, we kind of fall in a special category. Because of SSI, you guys know where I stand in my health care. it is continued fairly, regularly without my having to lift a finger – that’s amazing to me. It’s wonderful. And I thank you for it. But if you can do it for that, surely you can do it for the other things, which I think is the point of your being here today.

Now, I do realize that you do have different federal requirements, different agency requirements, and thresholds that you have to pass. But if you can – IF you can – unify that and make my life simpler, I think you make your life simpler as well.

It’s clear to me that you’re going to have, as I think it was pointed out, your workers are going to have a better experience. They’re going to be able to serve your clients better. You’re going to save money by being able to do that. And everyone’s life will be happier.

I’m going to say one thing specifically that’s kind of outside the realm today. I can reach you guys. I can speak to you guys. I can influence you somewhat. And so I need you to be our eyes and ears and voice to bring messages from us to federal counterparts and to our federal delegation who are harder to reach – who are harder to get them to hear – because they’re a little bit more entrenched in party politics.

So please look for and take opportunities to influence them to step outside of party talking points and get done the job that needs to be done for their constituents – for people, for human beings – to provide that compassionate support and care that is the proper role of government in certain places, and that we all desire to do for our fellow human beings.

I do wish to thank you for the hope. And I don’t mean just Mr. Hope, but the hope you provided me today – that you are serious about addressing some of this and about resolving some of this and still in my lifetime. And so, thank you for that.

Finally, I’d like to say this. If you need anybody to beta test or give you feedback on things, I came here today because I have opinions and I want to share them. So if you need that, please reach out to me. I’m happy – happy – to do that for you.