Dialogic Magazine

By: News Analysis On: August 4, 2011

In light of the disproportionate percentage of black and Latino men who are unemployed, incarcerated, or undereducated in New York, NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg has announced a new program that will pour $127 million of funding into efforts to improve the situations and opportunities of some 315,000 men. Mayor Bloomberg is donating $30 million of his own funds to the project, which will address education, socioeconomic conditions, employment, and incarceration. Experts hope that the research and data produced from this initiative will serve as a model for other states and cities and a guide for building similar programs

Politico: “In an unusual move for an elected official, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is pitching in $30 million of his own money to launch a city program aimed at helping young black and Latino men. Hedge fund billionaire George Soros is also donating $30 million to the project, while the city will spend $67.5 million on it…It’s being billed as the “boldest and most comprehensive effort to tackle the broad disparities slowing the advancement of black and Latino young men” in the country, Bloomberg’s office said in a statement. The program will offer job placement services, fatherhood classes, and training for school staff and probation officers on how to help young men improve themselves. “When we look at poverty rates, graduation rates, crime rates and employment rates, one thing stands out: blacks and Latinos are not fully sharing in the promise of American freedom and far too many are trapped in circumstances that are difficult to escape,” Bloomberg said as he announced the program.”

New York Post: One example that Bloomberg called “one of the most disheartening statistics I’ve ever heard” was the recidivism rate at the city’s jail system, where “three out of four young men who leave Rikers Island return to Rikers Island.”…Changes in the offing include: added jobs programs in public housing developments; “reinventing probation” by moving services to satellite offices within communities; new mentoring and internship services; securing IDs for young people to help them get jobs and pushing city agencies to hire more ex-cons…The mayor has tried before to crack the cycle of poverty by offering cash payments to poor parents who performed tasks beneficial to themselves and society, such as taking their kids to medical check-ups. That privately-funded $50 million experiment ended in failure, when researchers determined that the paid-off parents didn’t act much differerently than those in a control group who weren’t getting any money.”

Christian Science Monitor: “The money will go to four distinct areas:

Education. In an effort to get black and Latino men ready for college, the city (with the help of the private money) will begin a program called Expanded Success. This program will target 40 high schools that have already shown some progress in closing so-called achievement gaps. Students will get additional academic support, increased access to college classes, and mentors.

Socioeconomic and health issues. The city plans to expand one of its efforts called the Fatherhood Initiative to get fathers more involved in their children’s lives. This will include working with the City University of New York to provide parenting workshops. The program will also try to make city hospitals, health clinics, and reproductive services more welcoming to young men, especially helping them avoid fatherhood until they are ready.

Employment. The program will invest $25 million to expand a city program called Jobs Plus, which helps connect residents in public housing to jobs. An additional $9 million will go to enlarge a subsidized internship program. The city will also help young minority men obtain state-issued IDs, since “too many young people don’t have IDs, making it difficult for them to apply for jobs, open bank accounts, or receive government benefits and services,” said Bloomberg.

Incarceration. The city will try to turn its Probation Department from a “compliance factory” into an agency that connects youthful offenders with employment and educational opportunities. To do this, it will start to move probation offices into the projects and neighborhoods where blacks and Latinos live.”