If you're not living up to your zip code's economic profile, don't you DESERVE to be punished?

The Henry Street Settlement's Boys & Girls Republic, an after-school program at the Lillian Wald Houses in Manhattan's East Village, serves several hundred students each day. "More than three-quarters of the children at the Boys & Girls Republic come from families that receive some form of public assistance."

"There may be increasing affluence in the East Village, but there are also huge pockets of poverty. Doing this by zip code really misses the boat in terms of serving children with extraordinary need."

-- Robin Bernstein, president-CEO of Educational Alliance, which
runs an after-school program at P.S. 64 in the East Village

"You wouldn't say [that the neighborhood isn't a high-need area] if you came to my school. I don't get it. There's still a good portion of the community that is high-need, high-risk, and we need to provide them with services."

-- a "baffled" Marlon Hosang, principal of P.S. 64

"Felicia Castro, 45, a hospital manager whose 8- and 5-year-old sons go to P.S. 64's after-school program, said she doesn't know what she would do if she suddenly had to pay a babysitter $15 an hour to watch her boys until she can get home from work. 'I'm very concerned,' Castro said. 'It's just a shame. [After-school programs] serve the working class.' "

-- from Julie Shapiro's DNAinfo report, "East Village Too
Wealthy to Merit Free After-School Programs"

by Ken

As if life wasn't complicated enough, now you have to worry about whether your zip code is a correct predictor of your actual lifestyle. It just gets more and more complicated. Of course, for the people who are getting screwed in today's life lesson, there isn't much they can do about it anyway. It's not as if they can just pack up and move to an, um, unluckier zip code.

I imagine we've all noticed for some time now that a lot of U.S. demographic-breakdown analysis is done now in terms of zip codes. Presumably there are established profiles of all of them, which are used by marketers, fund-raisers, campaign strategists -- anyone who can benefit from knowing what kind of people live where. You'll read, for example, of would-be high-end marketers trying to peddle some kind of "luxury" crap or other to rich swells depending on zip-code data.

In the back of my head I guess I've always wondered how precisely this kind of economic and social profiling works. I mean, are populations within zip codes really homogeneous enough to make it really viable? I've tended to assume that for a lot of statistical breakdowns it's close enough.

But what happens when real live people find themselves living in a zip code they don't "fit into," economic-profile-wise? Well, it turns out there's a good chance they're gonna get screwed. Luckily, screwing people at the lower end of the economic spectrum is practically an American civic ritual. You'd think they'd have the decency and sense just to STFU.

By way of preface to today's cautionary tale, I should explain that the East Village area of Manhattan, which now includes much of what once was known as the Lower East Side, conjuring all those images of crowded-together tenement-dwelling immigrant populations, has become one of its hottest, up-and-comingest neighborhoods -- having been one of the few remaining areas where younger and artistically inclined folk could afford to settle. (Of course, once the gentrification process takes hold, the likelihood is that they're not going to be able to remain, but they'll have served their purpose.)

However, the gentrification of the Lower East Side is far from complete, meaning that sizable number of the kinds of people who have to be pushed out to make the neighborhood truly fit for moneyed folk haven't yet been pushed out. And now the joke's on them, because it turns out that their area has been officially graded sweet.

Graded by, it should be noted, city and state officials, looking for people to screw. Okay, that may be a slightly harsh way of putting it. It's not as if those officials get pleasure out of screwing schoolkids. It's just that in the present economic climate it has been determined (yes, I noticed that I switched into that lofty passive voice -- "it has been determined") that only a certain number of schoolkids can be served with after-school programs, which is a less crappy way of saying that all the others in need have to be screwed.

"The number of after-school programs in Manhattan's elementary and middle schools in both high- and low-need areas," Julie Shapiro reports for DNAinfo.com, "will drop to 29 next fall, down from 71. Programs in the low-need areas will be hardest hit, with just five elementary and four middle school programs in all of Manhattan expected to receive funding next fall, down from the 25 that are currently funded."

The city determines which zip codes are high-need by looking at how many children are living in poverty, how many are English language learners and how many are in state-subsidized childcare, according to a Department of Youth and Community Development spokeswoman. The spokeswoman did not immediately comment on the specific factors that caused the East Village to move off the "target" list.

I guess if the city didn't pick the victims by zip code, the budget-cutters would have to resort to methods like a lottery, or sticking pins into a map blindfolded, or maybe just random selection. With the decision having been made at loftier levels that a certain number of public-school kids have to be screwed, I guess doing it by zip code represents at least an attempt to skew the screwing away from the poorest families.

I'm including the full DNAinfo report here (there are links onsite), because I found myself unable to pick and choose among the details reporter Julie Shapiro provides. For example, if we worked from the traditional newspaper principle of "pyramind-style" writing and cut from the end, we would miss the detail of the free dinner offered by the University Settlement after-school program at P.S. 63. "The kids may eat again later at night," says University Settlement CEO Michael Zisser, "but we don't know."

Zisser also says: "You don't want these kids roaming around on the streets. You don't want to see regression. You don't want to see it go the wrong way." Without city funding, he says, University Settlement will be unable to continue its program at P.S. 63.

As David Garza, executive director of Henry Street Settlement, which operates the Boys & Girls Republic, says, ""It's really an all-out assault on working families and the working poor." I don't expect we'll be hearing much from or about these kids or their families or their schools in the course of the presidential campaign.

East Village Too Wealthy to Merit Free After-School Programs

The city may cut funding to the Boys & Girls Republic after-school program in the East Village.

January 10, 2012 6:53am | By Julie Shapiro, DNAinfo Reporter/Producer

EAST VILLAGE -- The city is slashing funding to free after-school programs in the East Village because the neighborhood has grown too wealthy to receive the services, city documents show.

The 10009 zip code, which covers the East Village, has long been a "target" zip code for the Department of Youth and Community Development, meaning it's one of the neediest in the city and is a top priority for after-school funding.

But this year, local nonprofits and community leaders were shocked to learn that the East Village had been dropped from the city's "target" list, endangering the area's after-school programs starting next fall.

"There may be increasing affluence in the East Village, but there are also huge pockets of poverty," said Robin Bernstein, president and CEO of the Educational Alliance, which runs an after-school program at P.S. 64 at Avenue B and East Sixth Street. "Doing this by zip code," Bernstein continued, "really misses the boat in terms of serving children with extraordinary need."

The city plans to cut after-school funding in every part of the city this year. The number of after-school programs in Manhattan's elementary and middle schools in both high- and low-need areas will drop to 29 next fall, down from 71, according to city records and the New York City Youth Alliance.

Programs in the low-need areas will be hardest hit, with just five elementary and four middle school programs in all of Manhattan expected to receive funding next fall, down from the 25 that are currently funded, according to city documents.

"It's going to be terrible," said Susan Stetzer, district manager of Community Board 3. "It's going to be very bad. A lot of people have needs in this community."

Marlon Hosang, principal of the East Village's P.S. 64 [left], said he was baffled that the city does not consider the neighborhood a high-need area. "You wouldn't say that if you came to my school," Hosang said. "I don't get it. There's still a good portion of the community that is high-need, high-risk, and we need to provide them with services."

The Educational Alliance's free, five-days-a-week program at P.S. 64, a Title I school, serves about 100 students a week, including many who live in public housing on Avenue D, Hosang said.

The program -- which offers homework help, cooking classes, dance instruction, sports, arts and science activities -- costs about $173,000 a year to run, nearly all of which now comes from the city, the Educational Alliance said.

"It would be incredibly devastating," said Tinea Little, director of the after-school program at P.S. 64. "I know the parents. If they cannot have their child in after-school, they can't work. It's really do or die for some parents out there."

Felicia Castro, 45, a hospital manager whose 8- and 5-year-old sons go to P.S. 64's after-school program, said she doesn't know what she would do if she suddenly had to pay a babysitter $15 an hour to watch her boys until she can get home from work.

"I'm very concerned," Castro said. "It's just a shame. [After-school programs] serve the working class."

The city has not yet announced which after-school programs will be cut, only that cuts are coming.

The city determines which zip codes are high-need by looking at how many children are living in poverty, how many are English language learners and how many are in state-subsidized childcare, according to a Department of Youth and Community Development spokeswoman.
The spokeswoman did not immediately comment on the specific factors that caused the East Village to move off the "target" list.

Other East Village after-school programs that could be cut include University Settlement's program at P.S. 63, on East Third Street between First Avenue and Avenue A, and Henry Street Settlement's Boys & Girls Republic at the Lillian Wald Houses, on East Sixth Street between Avenue D and FDR Drive.

More than three-quarters of the children at the Boys & Girls Republic after-school program come from families that receive some form of public assistance, said David Garza, executive director of Henry Street Settlement.

"It's really an all-out assault on working families and the working poor," Garza said.

At P.S. 63, the after school program does more than just teach kids about computers and art -- it also offers them a free dinner, because many of them need it, said Michael Zisser, CEO of University Settlement.

"The kids may eat again later at night, but we don't know," Zisser said.

He added that without city funding, University Settlement wouldn't be able to keep the program at P.S. 63 open.

"You don't want these kids roaming around on the streets," Zisser said. "You don't want to see regression. You don't want to see it go the wrong way."

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