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PEG'd Away is a issue brief by United Neighborhood Houses, detailing the impact of PEGs to City agencies that provide core community services, such as Department for the Aging, Department for Youth and Community Development, Administration for Children's Services, Department of Homeless Services, and others. 

Twice a year, in order to close gaps in the City's budget, City agencies face the task of cutting spending; in City-speak, these budget reductions are known as Programs to Eliminate the Gap (PEGs). Over the last several decades in NYC, Peg'd has become the most unlikely of verbs, as in "this program just got Peg'd," meaning the City budget proposal includes a program that will be restructured or eliminated for cost savings.

PEG'd Away also explores the changing role of the City Council. Once, the Council was able to use its discretionary funding to support innovative initiatives and meet emerging community needs. Now, this one-year discretionary funding is used to keep core human services afloat. Learn more by downloading PEG'd Away or viewing it online. 

 

The city hopes EarlyLearn will make for higher-quality city-funded daycare. Despite funding shortages and doubts about the way contracts were awarded, some agencies and advocates believe the program has promise.

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Without raising the tax bar, education, child care, libraries and other city services will be spared – despite original concerns of heavy cuts – in the 2013 Fiscal Year budget, city officials announced Monday, June 25 attributing the balanced budget to several cost-saving methods.

“When times were better, the city set aside surplus revenue — and when the first storm clouds gathered in 2007, we began cutting budgets,” said Mayor Michael Bloomberg. “These actions — and our work over the past decade to diversify the economy and make it less reliant on Wall Street — have allowed us avoid the severe service cuts that many other cities are facing.”

About $150 million will be added from the mayor’s May Executive Budget, which proposed a large child care cut, to the Administration for Children’s Services Child Care Program and the Department of Youth and Community Development Out-of-School Time program, ensuring child care stays well-funded in the City.

The funding is a major accomplishment for child care, said Gregory Brender, policy advisor for United Neighborhood Houses.

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A total of 151 organizations claiming to represent more than 1 million New Yorkers have joined the Campaign for Children and signed a letter to Mayor Michael Bloomberg opposing proposed cuts to child care and after-school programs.  The groups say that the Mayor’s Executive Budget proposals for FY2012-13, which begins July 1st, will eliminate funding for 47,000 child care and after-school slots.

“Enacting these cuts will deal a devastating blow to struggling children and families,” the letter states.  “As a Mayor seeking to improve the education of our children, ensure college and career readiness for black and Latino youth, and stabilize the City’s economy, we believe you should reassess proposed budget cuts in the realm of child care and after-school.”

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A coalition of more than 150 New York organizations, ranging from the Police Athletic League to the Children's Aid Society, have signed a letter urging Mayor Michael Bloomberg to restore $170 million for children's services to his proposed budget.

The coalition, called the Campaign for Children, is asking the mayor to make sure that his budget includes funding for some 47,000 child care and after-school slots currently bound for the trash bin. The letter notes that funding for child care and after-school programs has declined each year since 2009. As a result, the city's subsidized child care and after-school systems serve 43,000 fewer children than they did five years ago.

The coalition plans to send the letter on Thursday. Gregory Bender, a policy analyst at United Neighborhood Houses NY and a spokesperson for the coalition, said, "This massive display of support is a message loud and clear from New York City to Mayor Bloomberg: 'You must restore funding for child care and after-school programs that children and working families depend on.'" 


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Low-income families are guaranteed child care assistance under federal law, and their care is paid for through block grants. But under the new city rules, households just above the poverty level would not be guaranteed assistance. The changeover is expected to remove at least 8,200 seats currently used by low-income working families.

Depending on how many contracts are approved, as many as 15,900 seats could be cut, predicted Greg Brender, a policy analyst at the United Neighborhood Houses.  “The Mayor just hasn’t made the commitment he needs to to New York’s children,” said Brender. “There’s just not enough care available for those who need it.”

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These are uncertain time for many parents of young children in New York. Although the city has restored some of the cuts originally proposed in childcare, the mayor's executive budget still calls for reductions. In addition, the city is planning alterations to the system that raise other questions among parents and childcare workers.

 

"It really is a time of change, and I'm not sure it's positive,” said acting director of early childhood services at Leggett, Ledia Rivera. "It's going to be a taxing time for parents."

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Hayley Feliciano was prepping for another day of learning and play at the Bay Ridge Child Care Center when she got the call: the city’s budget had proposed slashing $91 million from child care services, eliminating 16,462 seats, 119 classrooms and several centers throughout the city.

“I would be losing at least one classroom, 16 kids and three to five staff members,” said Feliciano, who works as the educational director at the center, 314-322 44th Street. “We have the letter saying we will be cut. It’s last minute, to tell a parent they have no child care. They’re already [struggling] to support their families.”

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In his latest budget proposal, Mayor Bloomberg agreed to scale back proposed cuts and funding for early childhood care. Still, the remaining deductions will affect the youngest and most vulnerable New Yorkers.

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