Tracie McMillan, Author at Tracie McMillan

Bloomberg’s War on Poverty

January 22, 2025September 19, 2006

The Huffington Post • Sept. 19, 2006

With the Katrina anniversary come and gone, it’s unclear how quickly poverty will recede from public debate. But in New York City, it was yanked back to center stage by yesterday’s announcement of the findings of a high-profile antipoverty commission chartered by Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

Taking on poverty at the local level is a bold proposition–not least because much of the funding for antipoverty initiatives comes from the feds. It’s also an increasingly necessary approach as the federal government further abdicates responsibility for doing so, and funding correspondingly recedes. As such, the experiment in New York helps illuminate a couple important ideas about contemporary poverty–and government’s role in alleviating it.

New Directions Seen in Aid to City’s Poor

January 22, 2025September 5, 2006

City Limits • Sept. 5, 2006

City officials are considering a move away from the strictest elements of New York’s poverty policy over the last decade, most notably by creating easier procedures for the poor to receive government aid and considering new ways to help needy people living above the federally-defined poverty threshold.

The Mayor’s Commission for Economic Opportunity drew attention last week after an internal memo detailing its likely recommendations, including targeting resources toward three specific demographic groups, was written about in the New York Times. But a closer look suggests that broader shifts are afoot.

Making Waves

January 22, 2025September 1, 2006

Contribute • September/October 2006

In 1989, South African advertising executive Trevor Field wasn’t looking to start a charity. He just couldn’t help himself. One day, during a visit to an agricultural fair outside of Johannesburg, he stumbled across a curious invention — an irrigation system powered by a merry-go-round. As children ran to spin it, they powered a pump that pulled gallon after gallon of water from the ground.

It didn’t take long for Field to realize that he was on to something big. He already knew that about as many people die from bad water in South Africa as from HIV or malaria, and most who do are under the age of five. So why not attach the same kinds of pumps to freshwater storage tanks and bring clean drinking water to sub- Saharan Africa? Paying for it would be a snap, he figured; convince a company to slap an ad on the side of the tank.

Working, Stiffed

January 22, 2025August 25, 2006

The American Prospect • Aug. 25, 2006

It’s difficult to imagine a more sympathetic figure than Barbara Brooks. A full-time child care supervisor and part-time college student, Brooks is raising five kids on her own in a downmarket Long Island town. In the entire 90 minutes of Roger Weisberg’s Waging a Living, a documentary about the working poor set to air on PBS on August 29, few moments resonate more than when Brooks wipes away tears to explain, “The harder I work, the harder it gets.”

Premiering a week after the tenth anniversary of welfare reform, Brooks’ on-screen debut also happens to fall precisely one year after Hurricane Katrina thrust poverty back into the national consciousness.

Welfare Reform’s Silver Lining

January 22, 2025August 22, 2006

The Huffington Post • Aug. 22, 2006

You can generally count me out in heralding welfare reform as an unmitigated success. When President Clinton signed the bill into law ten years ago today, on August 22, 1996, he struck a dicey bargain, based on a premise that only a rich man would find credible: To end poverty, people had merely to go to work.

That’s true if you’ve got minimum wages starting around $20 an hour, public health care, free child care and housing subsidies for anyone who needs it. Unless I’ve somehow missing something in five years on the poverty beat, none of that describes contemporary America.

Welcome Shoppers

January 22, 2025August 21, 2006

City Limits • Aug. 21, 2006

From beneath a purple awning emblazoned with “East New York Bargain$ For Less,” a handful of local residents are working to put a fresh spin on its previous tenant’s declaration by opening the neighborhood’s first food cooperative.

By mid-September, volunteers and staff from the Local Development Corporation of East New York hope to open the doors on a member-run grocery store featuring high-quality fresh produce, as well as bulk dry goods and other prepared foods. It’s the latest in a series of efforts by the East New York Food Policy Council, a project of the LDC, and other local activists to bolster access to fresh, healthy food in East New York.

Foodies in da ‘Hood?

January 22, 2025August 15, 2006

The Huffington Post • Aug. 15, 2006

Forget organics. Stop worrying about local. Just get some fresh food into the ‘hood. That’s a pretty basic summary of the latest brainstorm in the “How do we stop being so fat?” conundrum: Use bodegas–the cheap corner stores found in poor urban neighborhoods–as beacons of health. If it sounds unlikely that the local one-stop ice cream/malt liquor shop could be a promoter of sound nutrition, you’d best pause a moment and really take a look at the Bodegas as Catalysts for Healthy Living Act, introduced into the House in late July by Rep. Nydia Velazquez (D-NY).

Jicama in the ‘Hood

January 22, 2025August 2, 2006

Salon • Aug. 2, 2006

Amid a crowd of New York City public high-schoolers, Antonio Mayers, 16, is trying — with modest success — to wrap his head around the idea of freezing a mango pit for later consumption as a popsicle.

“How long you put it in the freezer?”

“Just until it gets, you know, frozen. It’s really good,” says Michael Welch. Welch is leading Mayers and his tittering cohorts in a cooking class coordinated by EatWise, a New York nutrition and food systems education group.

Series: Getting By

January 22, 2025July 25, 2006

The Young and the Jobless New York’s newest growth industry is a generation of young adults who are not in school and not employed. Most aren’t even looking for work. A changing economy is partly to blame–but so is government’s disinvestment in job training. Ending Workfare as We Know It? With 400,000 still on the … Read more

Body by Bodega

January 22, 2025July 24, 2006

City Limits • July 24, 2006

Bushwick – > Federal officials are opening up a new front in the fight against obesity: access. Heading the charge is Congresswoman Nydia Velázquez, representing parts of Brooklyn, Queens, and the Lower East Side, who plans this week to introduce the Bodegas as Catalysts for Healthy Living Act. If enacted, it would mark the first federal effort to target the issue of food quality and availability in the nation’s low-income communities.

The bill, which is also backed by the Washington Heights-based Bodega Association of the United States and local public health officials, would create a federal program offering grants through the Small Business Administration to help bodegas and corner stores stock and maintain fresh fruits and vegetables, along with low-fat milk and real fruit juices.