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Opportunity NYC

NYC to Try Buying Good Parenting; Cash Grant Initiative Modeled on Mexico's

May 27, 2007, Chicago Tribune
By Colin McMahon--Chicago Tribune
Excerpts

An article in the Chicago Tribune published Sunday, May 27 covers the announcement and details of Opportunity NYC, a privately funded program to address persistent poverty in New York. The Rockkefeller Foundation has teamed up with a number of other foundations and New York's mayor Mike Bloomberg to design, execute and evaluate the Opportunity NYC pilot, currently slated to launch in the Fall of 2007.

The Tribune article noted that...

...The program is modeled after Oportunidades in Mexico, a 10-year-old aid initiative that has been credited with alleviating Mexico's direst poverty. The Mexican system, like conditional cash-transfer programs in Brazil and other Latin American nations, makes demands on participants while offering small but meaningful cash rewards.

The cash goes directly to the family, almost always the mother or other female head of the household. Parents can receive from $40 to $100 a month if they fulfill such responsibilities as taking their children to the doctor or keeping them in school.

That approach has won praise across the political spectrum. A centrist government started Mexico's program, but it took off under a conservative administration. Brazil's Family Fund was founded by a fiscal moderate but expanded greatly under a left-of-center government.

Those on the right applaud the system because it relies on individual initiative and acts as an investment in the future: Children in the program are healthier, they stay in school longer and they grow up with a better chance to become productive citizens. Those on the left say the program helps stabilize troubled families and gives poor children more consistent access to society's benefits.

The article goes on to say:

Though the health-care components will be similar, New York's education side will be more rigorous. Parents might have to attend school meetings. And benefits will be tied not to enrollment, which is mandatory by law, but to attendance and achievement. The goal is to foster attendance because "in the very poor communities that we are targeting, attendance is lower, and it falls off dramatically in the older school years," said Linda Gibbs, deputy mayor for health and human services.

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