Casey Promotes Family Economic Success in New Haven

The Annie E. Casey Foundation and its direct service agency, Casey Family Services, are stepping up efforts to encourage economic success for New Haven families.

"The Casey Foundation recently completed a scan of New Haven services and found numerous gaps," says John Padilla, senior fellow with the Foundation. "There are a number of reasons why this is so, but the bottom line is that there simply are not enough supportive programs to help families achieve some modicum of economic security. Research shows that when a family is financially stable, children are more likely to have positive outcomes and families are more likely to remain intact and safe. It’s important for New Haven, as a community, to develop durable pathways to help vulnerable families achieve financial stability and strength."

Some possible avenues: finding employment for families in a city in which less than 60 percent of its residents are employed, and more than 12,000 families are poor. In a community with especially high housing costs, these facts spell economic disaster for many parents and children.

Casey is working with other local funders and community providers to discuss possible areas of collaboration that could lead to better outcomes for New Haven families. In 2008, this group will focus on developing areas of common interest to give their collective grant–making more impact, assessing how best to bridge the education gaps of many job seekers, and then developing pathways that can connect job seekers to jobs that are driving economic growth in the local economy. The overall goal for Casey, its partners, and its grantees through its Direct Service Grants Program, will be to create new opportunities for strengthening and connecting their work in order to better meet the needs of New Haven families.

Toward that end, Casey hosted a learning session for the New Haven Funders Group — that includes philanthropy, civic, municipal, and educational leaders — on efforts of other communities to improve employment and economic opportunities for low–income families. Participants heard from funders of a Boston–based workforce development group , the director of Casey’s Family Economic Success unit, and the Director of the Governor’s Office for Workforce Competitiveness. In April, funders gathered for a one–day retreat to work on a plan of action.