Clients of the Chickasaw Nation Women, Infants and Children Supplemental Nutrition Program, known as WIC, now may use an electronic benefits transfer debit card for qualified food purchases under an initiative Chickasaw Nation Ardmore (Okla.) Nutrition Services launched Oct. 25.
The Chickasaw Nation is the first WIC agency in Oklahoma to distribute benefits using a magnetic stripe card, which replaces paper checks or vouchers. Officials from the agency were not immediately available to comment.
J. P. Morgan Treasury Services, a unit of JPMorgan Chase & Co., is the card issuer. The company provides EBT and debit card services for food stamp and other benefits to some 11 million cardholders in 30 states and U.S. territories, the United Kingdom and South America.
Computer Sciences Corp., or CSC, of Falls Church, Va., developed the software for the Successful Partners in Reaching Innovative Technology certification software system the Chickasaw Nation uses to determine applicant eligibility and nutritional risk, and it helped make the system EBT-functional.
The SPIRIT system is one of three systems under the State Agency Model project, which is a Food and Nutrition Service five-year initiative to plan, develop and deploy model information systems in WIC state agencies. The Chickasaw Nation WIC program is the first SAM system to use an EBT card.
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