A battle between the Bloomberg administration and the City Council over the food-stamp program is expected to come to a head today and may end up in court if the two sides don’t come to an agreement.

During a meeting this afternoon, the council plans to override the mayor’s vetoes of legislation that would make it easier to apply for food stamps, by making applications available at soup kitchens and on the Internet and allowing residents to submit applications by fax.

“This is a common-sense plan that values families, rewards hard work, and cuts out red tape,” the lead sponsor of two of the three bills, Council Member Eric Gioia of Queens, said.

“I’m not looking to give the mayor a black eye, but I’m hoping we can work with him on this,” Mr. Gioia said. “This is exactly the kind of thing you would expect him to embrace. It is bringing private-sector business practices to an inefficient government bureaucracy.”

According to city estimates, barely half of the 2 million city residents who are eligible for food stamps receive them. Council members said a high percentage of the others are people working in low-paying jobs who have given up on qualifying because of logistical hurdles, such as having to make a special trip to an inconvenient government office to pick up and fill out applications.

Mr. Bloomberg, a former entrepreneur whose net worth is estimated to be roughly $4 billion, said in his veto message that the council lacks authority to pass legislation on the matter and that altering the city’s responsibilities violates state and federal law. Mr. Bloomberg also touted work his administration has done to increase access to food stamps.

Pursuing the issue further by taking the council to court, however, could leave the mayor more vulnerable to critics who say he’s out of touch with the city’s working class and poor residents – groups he is trying to woo in his bid for re-election.

Council Member Bill de Blasio, a Brooklyn Democrat who sponsored the bill on submitting applications by fax, said he was glad that the number of people getting food stamps has increased to more than 1 million from the roughly 800,000 since Mr. Bloomberg took office, because it shows that the program is more accessible. He said, however, the administration failed to demonstrate that anything was being done to build further accessibility.