Civil Justice, Inc.
This grant supports a new project of Civil Justice, the Medical Debt Collection Defense Project. Through this program, Civil Justice will provide direct legal representation for approximately 50 Baltimore City residents who are being sued for medical debt. Through these cases, Civil Justice will identify systemic abuses and use impact litigation to stop these abuses.
Catherine’s Family and Youth Services
Catherine’s Family and Youth Services (CFYS) serves families, youth, and seniors in Park Heights and other communities in Northwest Baltimore. CFYS provides a range of services, including a free after school and summer program for neighborhood youth, a food pantry, school supply drives, clothing distribution events, and referrals to other agencies for additional services. This grant supports CFYS’s emergency food distribution program, which provides prepared meals for 500 – 1,000 people each week through a partnership with World Central Kitchen and Breaking Bread restaurant, a Black-owned Baltimore restaurant. In addition, CFYS supplements the prepared meals with donations of meat, produce, bread, nonperishable foods, baby supplies, paper goods and cleaning supplies.
BUILD
Baltimoreans United in Leadership Development (BUILD) is a broad-based coalition of faith institutions, schools and neighborhood associations that collaborate to make Baltimore a better place to live, work and raise a family. This grant supports BUILD’s COVID-19 Emergency Food Program. Launched in April 2020, the program provides weekly deliveries of food to 1,250 families in East Baltimore who have been adversely impacted by the Coronavirus pandemic. BUILD is working with four East Baltimore churches, and housing developer ReBUILD Metro, to identify families in need of food assistance and deliver weekly boxes of produce and nonperishable foods. In addition to providing food for families struggling with food insecurity, the program provides part-time employment for the drivers who deliver the food, most of whom are residents of the communities served and in many cases receive food assistance themselves.
Baltimore Urban Debate League
The Baltimore Urban Debate League (BUDL) has brought debate into Baltimore’s public school classrooms over the last two decades, improving academic skills, increasing student voice and engagement, and fostering social-emotional growth. This grant supports BUDL’s elementary and middle school program, with the aim of rebounding to its pre-COVID-19 reach in schools and students served.
Baltimore Regional Housing Partnership
Baltimore Regional Housing Partnership (BRHP) was created in 2012 as a result of the settlement of the landmark civil rights lawsuit, Thompson v. HUD, which sought to remedy decades of discriminatory public housing policies that left thousands of low-income African American families perpetually locked in high poverty neighborhoods in Baltimore City. BRHP administers the Baltimore Housing Mobility Program, which couples Housing Choice Vouchers (formerly known as “Section 8”) with pre- and post-move counseling to support families who want to move from areas of deeply concentrated poverty to areas of opportunity throughout the Baltimore region. To date, BRHP has assisted over 5,000 families to move to low poverty communities with high performing schools, low levels of crime, and healthy environments, among other benefits.
Despite the significant benefits for families who have made these moves, BRHP data shows that many of the families served have stagnant incomes. To address this concern, BRHP has designed a new program called Growing Assets and Income (GAIN). The GAIN program is modeled on the successful, federally funded Family Self Sufficiency (FSS) program administered by a number of public housing authorities, which provides financial incentives to participants who achieve employment, education and other goals. Evaluations of FSS programs have found that participants had significant increases in incomes, as well as improved credit scores and reduced debt. The GAIN program builds on lessons learned from housing authorities that have implemented FSS programs.
GAIN will provide participants with counseling, resource connections, and financial incentives tied to achievement of client-created goals, all designed to support clients in achieving financial stability and self-sufficiency. This grant supports a two-year pilot of the GAIN program that will serve 250 clients.