Economic Opportunity News
"Nationally, the Recovery Act's Temporary Assistance for Needy Families emergency fund provides training and work to young adults... -- and to adults who have a child. They also must be U.S. citizens with a household income level of less than 200 percent of the poverty level..."
"As part of the stimulus package, the federal government was willing to directly cover the wages of people who worked either for small businesses or local governments. Across the country, about 130,000 low-income adults got jobs. The program will expire at the end of September..."
"The University of Great Falls received a nearly $1.5 million five-year grant from the U.S. Department of Education to provide specialized counseling and tutoring to students from low-income families [and] students who are the first in their family to attend college..."
"'Meth. That's never a good drug,' Wrightsman said. Jail and homelessness followed. At 29, however, she's on her way back up again, living at Volunteers of America's Mather Community Campus and heading to Brazil to play for the United States in the Homeless World Cup."
"But the San Francisco health care worker decided to break the cycle of poverty. Now, the 38-year-old is a college graduate on the cusp of opening her own business. She is also raising a high-achieving teenager who is in a position to win merit-based college scholarships"
"[YouthBuild] Participants must be between 16 and 24, attending GED classes or want to attend them and be interested in learning basic construction skills. Participants get a stipend and GED instruction. Low-income people are preferred."
"On Aug. 31, Family Promise of Salem County (FPSC) will celebrate its first year in existence. They helped their first homeless family that day last year, and the single mom of two has since found a home and two jobs."
"'The land costs have always been one of the detriments to affordable housing,' said Norman Franklin, [a] vice president... at the Urban League. Having the city donate the land to make homeownership possible for low-income families 'hasn't happened in my memory,' he said."
"The stimulus package allowed states to ignore the reform law's attempt to get more people on welfare-to-work programs, which could have serious implications for job-training programs such as the ones offered by Goodwill, he said."
"The basic premise inspiring so many government subsidies — that any work, even menial work, is a first step out of poverty — has a hearty hopefulness to it and some logic."
"ShoreBank, for many years, showed that operating honorably in low-income neighborhoods could pay off for everybody"
"For several years, consumer advocates have pleaded with the IRS to prohibit RALs because they target low- to moderate-income folks, who need every penny of their refund"
"Even older Americas at the poverty level can get help from the federal Senior Community Service Employment Program. People who are over 50 and have been unemployed for more than six months are eligible"
"The impetus for the law actually came from Chicago's communities, where 40 years ago people saw neighborhoods across the city crippled by bank redlining -- the practice of denying someone a loan based on where they lived"
"A signature anti-poverty program of the Bloomberg administration is stumbling because of lax oversight, according to an audit by the city comptroller, John C. Liu"
"That means the turbines will ideally save Bluestone tens of thousands of dollars per year in electricity costs, allowing them to offer programs including job training and counseling free of charge to low-income residents and to invest more in attractive, ecological landscaping"
"Corporate employees have long donated their time to charitable causes. It's only in the past several years that volunteer work has gone beyond the soup kitchen to include skills-based programs that allow employees to donate not only their time but their talent"
"A new and at least partial solution for the homeless problem in the city sprung out of a man's desire to mobilize them so they can use bicycles to get jobs."
"For Jacqueline Parker, the road to homelessness was dazzling and well-lit. The 63-year-old Mississippi native had an apartment and a job when she began accompanying a friend to a Chicago-area casino to play the slot machines."
"Mayor Adrian M. Fenty's administration plugged that gap by moving millions of dollars some council members expected to go to homeless and other anti-poverty programs. Council members said they were not consulted on the big uptick in spending..."
"'. . . He loved to take care of people. No matter who it was, a homeless person, he never turned anyone away.' A sandwich, a job, a place to stay, for Melman, Mort gave no less than the bond that created his wildly successful empire, Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises."
"Nadeah Rasheed got an offer in 2008 that she could not refuse: find a stable job and the city would pay virtually all her rent. If everything went as planned, she and her two daughters would leave homelessness behind forever."
"Jones was one of 100 workers hired by the state Department of Human Resources last year to address growing delays in processing of food benefits and medical services for low-income Marylanders."
"'Let's pretend that someone's dropped out of high school,' he responds. 'They're working at low-income jobs, and they've got to the point where they know they need advanced training to make a good wage.'"
"Eligible individuals, state officials say, must be 14 to 21 years old and come from families whose household incomes fall below the poverty line, which is about $18,000 for a family of four."
Next »