Your Money Helpline

I volunteered at the call center for this today:

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Free Advice to help you through the Financial Crisis

THE ECONOMIC CRISIS affects everyone, from people struggling with their rent or mortgage to those losing their jobs or seeing the value of their pensions eroding.

But help is here! Starting Monday, the city’s Department of Consumer Affairs, The City University of New York and the Daily News will launch an unprecedented initiative to offer FREE advice to anyone who needs it.

The YOUR MONEY HELPLINE brings together some of the leading experts from across the city to give YOU the help you need. With uncertainty plaguing every aspect of personal fi nance, there has never been a greater need for the type of advice the YOUR MONEY HELPLINE will bring.

Our experts come from the City’s Office of Financial Empowerment, banks and credit unions, financial industry associations and participants, city agencies, CUNY’s business, finance and economics faculty, staff and student financial aid experts and other trained volunteers. Starting Monday morning, they will be available on a Daily News phone bank to answer all your questions and offer advice about weathering the financial storm.

They will provide help in English and Spanish – and advice will be featured on the Univision Spanish television channel and the Wado radio network.

It is vital help that could benefit all New Yorkers. Contacting the YOUR MONEY HELPLINE could be the most valuable call you ever make.

YOUR MONEY HELPLINE STARTS ON MONDAY DECEMBER 15.

Please remember that you can always call 311 or visit www.nyc.gov/ofe to learn about services available throughout New York City to help you through the financial crisis. And for quick information about free and low-cost financial education classes and counseling available in your area, visit the City's Financial Education Network Directory.

For information on higher educational opportunities and financial aid, job training, certificate programs, skills building and professional training programs at CUNY's 23 campuses, please visit: www.cuny.edu

Just couldn't stay away...

So, I'm back. I found I missed it. I'm still torn, but I thought I'd post these articles, and maybe a few pictures from summer.

This one I had to post after reading it myself and having three people send it to me, about becoming a New Yorker. I'm no New Yorker yet, but I do recognize many points well made. My favorite, a quote from one Mr. Chen:

"'I’m pretty good with the subways now, but at night it’s a little weird, and I don’t really know how that works.'

(Neither do we, Mr. Chen.)"

Also it mentions that in 2006, around 77,000 people in their 20s had been in the city for less than a year. I was one of those! I've told they probably didn't survey people in convents, though, so that takes the count up to at least 77,006.

Also, I thought as an avid opposer of gated communities and most HOAs, I thought this NYTimes blog post was good food for thought. In the comments section below the post, a lot of people say, if you don't like 'em, don't move to a neighborhood with a HOA. The scary thing is a lot of the new developments that go up all over the place have mandatory HOAs that do everything from mandate the color of your house to outlaw clotheslines. So if the only affordable place to live is a new development with a HOAs, there's not really a choice at all. It reminds me of that X-Files episode where this monster made of lawn dirt ate people who broke the neighborhood rules. Anyone? Anyone?

Pomp and Circumstance

So I write this, for dramatic effect, on the eve of my last night of being a Fellow! Tomorrow's it, the last day, the show is over say goodbye. Only, not really. Much of the melodrama is decidedly lost on me, since I decided to stay on at DHS for the summer. My title changes from fellow to intern, but my job will be largely the same. There are some projects I want to see through, such as this financial education initiative, so I'll be there until August when school starts.

The fellows had a "graduation" ceremony last week. Everyone got all dolled up, Bloomberg came and spoke (his advice: make your billions first, then go in to public service...), all in all it was a very nice evening. We started the event by getting there 15 minutes early and arranging ourselves on a picturesque stairwell for a photo-op, with a Bloomberg-sized hole in the front row. He arrived, inserted himself in the picture, and we were off! It must be strange to live your life shepherded around from one photo-op to another...

Anyways, that's a wrap, folks. I think this is probably the end of my blogging, but I do love to end on a photo montage, so there may be something more yet! No promises though. :-) Thanks for your reading and sticking it out through the end.

Much love,

Time for tea, and celebrity spotting #2

The Fellows had tea at Gracie Mansion yesterday morning, the mayoral residence of New York City, although Bloomberg doesn't actually live there (he thought his own digs on 79th St were good enough). Bloomie himself was there (a few of us caught a glimpse of him walking through the kitchen) supposedly having a budget meeting, but actually it turned out the commish of the Dept. of Buildings was resigning. Sad.

In the evening, I went to a special screening for DHS senior staff of this movie about a family experiencing homelessness. The movie itself wasn't great, and the discussion afterward with the director was, shall we say, very lively. The best part of the evening, however, was that as I was leaving the theater there was a small crowd waiting to get in for a screening of another movie, there on the sidewalk was Nick Sobotka from The Wire! As I have recently become addicted to this show, it was rather exciting.

That's all. Hope you enjoyed the links!

Bullet-proof vest and all

Last Tuesday I had the opportunity to do a police ride-along in the Bronx. Did you know that anyone can do a ride-along? You just have to fill out a request at the municipal building and pass some sort of approval process. Who knew? I now know, but didn't follow the process, it was part of our fellowship (one of things I was looking forward to the most! That, and Rikers...). I chose the 40th precinct, which is where I worked last year at Mercy Center. I was interested to see the streets that were so familiar to me in a different light. My UF partner Jess and I suited up in bullet-proof vests (no pictures allowed, unfortunately, although mine was waaaay too big and made me feel like I was wearing a life jacket...) and hopped in the back seat of the car with our two officers.

We took off with the siren shrieking and dodged traffic for a few blocks and I thought it they were just showing off, but as we approached an upcoming intersection it was clear something was going on, as there were a few other cop cars and an ambulance parked in a huddle. Our officers got out and Jess and I looked at each other, then scrambled out after them. It turned out a man had gotten slashed across the face by his ex-girlfriend's brother, he said. By the time we got there he was pretty patched up, and we listened to our officers as they questioned him and some of his friends who had witnessed it. Then we followed the ambulance to Lincoln Hospital to finish the report. I've never seen the inside of Lincoln Hospital before, although I've heard many horror stories from our participants and others in the Bronx, so it was interesting to finally get to go inside. No one paid much attention to the two of us, so we just followed walked around like we we knew what we were doing until someone told us to leave, and no one ever did. We sat in on more questioning of the guy who got slashed (who, by the way, was not someone I would want to mess with - he was huge!) and then headed back to the station to file some paperwork and switch cars (our siren had broken).

The rest of the evening was a little less eventful. We answered two calls of fires within 10 minutes and two blocks of each other. The first was from a beauty parlor, and the women were standing out front with their hair in HUGE rollers, the kind you see in the movies or music videos - I didn't know people actually used those. The firetrucks arrived simultaneously though and they were just investigating the smell of smoke, so there wasn't much for us to do. The second involved more crazy driving (with our now-working siren) and a climb up the stairs of an apartment building, where the upstairs neighbor had called 911 over what basically amounted to a burned dinner downstairs. We also stopped a guy for having an open container and checked on a tripped burglar alarm at a storage facility.

All in all, it was pretty eventful and very eye opening. And not just my eyes, either, you should have seen the stares we got riding around in the back of the cop car! Pretty funny. Anyway, definitely once in a lifetime experience.

In honor pretending to be a member of the uniformed services, but since they didn't let me take any pictures of the police ride, I'm posting this picture of my nephew and me a few weeks ago at his fourth birthday party in Florida. My sister knows someone and arranged to have a firetruck come, and everyone got to try on a firefighter coat, including the grown-ups. Cute, huh?

Googlegängers

As someone who has googled my name and others (is that something one admits in public?), I found this article from the NYTimes interesting. I was always happy that I am the only one with my name, but I can kinda see the appeal in having a Googlegängers...

In other news, the Fellows took a trip to Albany this week to talk to NYC lawmakers and lobbyists. Unfortunately, most of our trip was thwarted by the fact that everyone was is still in the process of finalizing the state budget, which was 9 days overdue. Most of our speakers canceled. We did get to see the capitol building (well, it's more of a complex), and I've never been to Albany before so I was happy to be somewhere new.

The Fellows in front of some very picturesque government building... (Note the winter jackets despite the fact that we're almost midway through April. When is it going to be spring, again?)
Only five more weeks of the fellowship left! I can't believe it. For those who were wondering, I am going to be attending The New School next year to get a masters in urban policy. I also will be retiring this blog. Yes, it's sad but true. Next year I will take up the unassuming role of the starving grad student just like a million other residents of this great city. Where's the public interest in that? Just wanted to put out a warning for my loyal readers. Enjoy 'em while they last...

The Fellows at Prison

So the highly anticipated annual Fellows trip to Rikers Island took place last week. For the uninitiated, Rikers is NYC's prison, located just off the "coast" of Queens, with a landmass of over 75 landfill. It's pretty much an entire city unto itself - complete with 10 prison facilities, a water treatment plant, a visiting house, central laundry and bakery and other pleasant amenities. The island is capable of housing up to 17,000 inmates, all of whom are either waiting to be sentenced or serving terms of one year or less.

We are able to take the tour because one of the Fellows works in the Discharge Planning division, which started just 5 years ago with the goal of reducing recidivism and homelessness among those released from Rikers. The division has formed a collaboration with the Dept. of Homeless Services and Dept. of Human Resources to help inmates about to be released access benefits, housing, employment services, legal assistance, education, etc. It sounds like they've really made a lot of progress in trying to help what would probably be the hardest service-needy population there is.

We took a tour of the one women's facility, and dropped in on a drug awareness class that is part of a voluntary support program for inmates who want to take advantage of the discharge planning process. At first it was incredibly uncomfortable - 25 fresh-faced Fellows standing in this room with 40 inmates during a drug support group - um, awkward. I felt like we were just staring at them in some sort of zoological exhibit. But then, their facilitator asked if they had any questions for us, and a woman says, "Um, who are you??" So one of the Fellows introduced the group, and the facilitator asked US if we had any questions. The last question asked was the most powerful, "What would you want people to know about you?" The answers: "I'm still a person." "Even though I've bad choices, I'm a good person." "I can change."

Then on a lighter note, we saw a demonstration of the canine unit. The officer planted a bag of pot (Where did it come from? We didn't ask...) in a gas tank. The dog, trained in what we learned was "passive alert," was let out of the van and went immediately for the cars. It took all of about 2o seconds to head to the rear of the car and sit down, looking happily at the officer with a look that said "Ok great, what's next?" Then the guy had all the Fellows line up and put the baggie in Elijah's pocket. The dog went right down the line and sat in front of him, tail wagging. You'd never guess he was actually saying, "Welp, here's the druggie!" It was pretty amazing.

Lunch was made for us by a group called Fresh Start, which is a culinary training program for male inmates. It was good, too! We also toured the nursery, a men's jail and the visiting house. I've never really thought about the reality of being locked up, but am I glad I've never had to. It was so strange walking through the halls. There are lines painted in the hallway and you have to walk between the lines and walls. We'd be walking down one side of the hallway and be passed by a line of inmates going in the other direction. I've never been so hyper aware of my situation vs. another's. You couldn't help feeling guilty just knowing that you were going to walk out of that building today and back into a normal life...

So anyway, that was my day at prison. It was enough to make one's head spin.

The elephants walk at midnight!

Erika and I went to Manhattan last night to watch the circus come into town. They block off 34th street and march the elephants from the Midtown Tunnel to Madison Square Gardens at midnight. We got there about 10 til, but were pretty far down the route so we had to stand out in the cold for about 45 minutes before they showed up. When they did, it was quick! Six elephants in a row, each holding a tail in their trunk. The crowd was small, but they had the streets blocked off with police barriers like for a regular parade. A small crowd ran along the sidewalks with the elephants, yelling and waving their hands. It was bizarre. But worth the wait. Next year I'd just go a little later. I tried to take pictures, but since I was doing a little running and the light was bad, they didn't turn out so great. I guess it's the kind of thing that's better just to remember, anyway, elephants walking through Herald Square...

Of course, the circus is bad and mistreats the animals (the animal rights activists were there also), don't go see it. But who can resist the elephants?

Ready, Set, Books! and other stories.

Last weekend I went with a few other volunteers from Mercy Center to take part in this book drive called Project Cicero, for teachers and other organizations that work with kids. You can have a team of five, and each person given a large box and one hour to wander through this huge ballroom filled with new and slightly used books. The box has to be left in the hallway, though, so you frantically fill your arms with as many as you can hold, run out to the hallway, dump your books into the box in a fairly organized fashion (the box has to close at the end, so you have to be an efficient packer). So basically it was like a giant kids' book easter egg hunt, or more like the daydream that I had as a kid that time would freeze (and so would everyone else but me) while I was in the grocery store so I could run around and eat whatever I wanted (I know, I was a strange one...). I love kids books, and it was so much fun just to be able to pick up all my old favorites, and whatever else struck my fancy. Between the five of us, we ended up with over five suitcases and two backpacks full of books that Mercy Center will use for the reading and after school program. The new books are especially great, because they give them out as gifts when the kids graduate.

In other news, a woman at work gave me some salsa dancing lessons at the Y. She was unable to complete the class because of back injury, and she knew I would like them, so she passed them on to me! I started this week, and I'm very excited about them. I don't dance nearly enough these days.

Annnnnnd, in a completely unrelated note, my friend Grant had his piece air on NPR this weekend, which is very exciting. You can listen to it here. Yay Grant!

Hmm, I think that's about it. Until next time,

HOPE Count Down

So the big news around DHS these days is that the results are in, and HOPE 2008 shows the homeless street population has decreased 12% since last year. If you want the long of it, check out the mayor's press release, and if you want the short of it, here's a short entry from the NYTimes City Room blog. The latter piece comes complete with a few public comments. People are already disputing the methodology of the count, and there was a slight public controversy because the guy from Columbia who ran the last two counts didn't do it this year. I leave it to them to debate.

Battling it out

Westerville is famous! Note the reference to Westerville being the "dry capital" before Prohibition. It's interesting to see Texas and Ohio linked all the time in the headlines these days, since for me, the two have always been linked. Tomorrow should be interesting!

America Saves! (not to be confused with Jesus) (sorry, is that sacrilegious?)

On Monday I got to go with the commissioner to a press conference at one of the neighborhood credit unions to promote America Saves week, a national movement to encourage household savings, especially for those with low income. DHS was invited, along with the Dept. of Consumer Affairs (DCA), because we both have asset building initiatives, and we are trying to link those initiatives to the more general initiatives that are going on around the country. Apparently it didn't rate high enough in either our agency or the DCA to make it on either website, and I think there were only a few (aka, two) actual press there, but I was still excited. I never thought I would be interested in the world of asset development and financial services, but as I learn more and continue to work with this program I am becoming convinced that basic financial literacy is essential for people to move out of poverty. And it's such a basic service, too - education about how to best use your money, and providing access to banking services to put that knowledge to work, are empowering in a way that other types of social services are not. I'm a fan.

Seattle

So yes, the big trip to Seattle. I left at the crack of dawn with a coworker, flew for 6 straight hours and landed on the west coast at 12 noon. Thank you, time change. We rushed to the already-in-progress in time to here the luncheon speaker introduced, but sadly, we missed lunch. The introducer caused quite a stir when he announced, "Mr. Bill Gates...senior." It was pretty funny because you could tell the whole audience was expecting Bill Gates, and didn't know quite how to react to his father. Anyway, the conference was interesting and I learned about a few other programs, but for the most part I think conferences are pretty overrated. I did enjoy going on a site visit to some supportive housing units specifically for formerly homeless families with lots of kids.

On Saturday my Westerville friend KellyB, who lives in Seattle and works as an ASL interpreter, picked me up and gave me the grand tour of the city. It was great to tour with an expert! I like the city a lot; it is very densely built, but also interspersed with lots of trees and hills and water. A good mix to keep things interesting. There are also lots of cute, distinctive, walkable neighborhoods. And lots of parks. And bakeries. You really couldn't ask for much more. Except maybe some sun. I would love to visit again in the summertime, when it's not so overcast and you can see the surrounding mountains.

Saturday was caucus day in Washington, so Kelly and I stopped by her local elementary school to cast her vote. I've never seen anything like it! Everyone from the neighborhood milled around the school until they found their designated spot (hers was in a corner of the library, along with three other districts), and signed in with their choice. After everyone was signed in, one person was allowed to speak for one minute in support of each delegate, then there was a short period when people could mill around and ask each other questions. They, the precinct captain asked if anyone wanted to change their vote, then tallied up the results. She announced Obama the winner, to lots of cheers. From there, apparently, they elect a certain amount of delegates to go to the official state caucus and cast their votes. It was all very interesting to see the democratic process in action in a way in such a community-oriented, hands-on sort of way, that you don't usually get to see.

After the caucus we met my cousin Alan and his wife Michelle at Pike Place Market, which is like El Mercado in San Antonio only a lot cooler (Sorry, San An). In addition to the usual touristy souvenirs, the market also sold lots of fresh fruit and fish and cheese and products from local artists. You could wander in there all day. I spent the night with Alan and Michelle (many thanks), and in the morning they took me for a run around a nearby lake before heading to the airport. There was a Valentine's Day 5K going on called "Love 'em or Leave 'em," which made me laugh. Then it was time to go, and that was that! Next weekend is a holiday and I am headed to Texas, so lots of traveling going on. Until next time, a few pictures.

Skyline view from across the lake.
A troll under an overpass, made out of VW Bugs (you can see one under his left hand).
Pike Place Market
This is not Seattle, but last week's tickertape parade.
Subway steam and tickertape debris

Ticker-tape

While I don't really care about the Superbowl, I do like a public spectacle (and confetti!), so I made my way out to Broadway, just one block from my office, to see what I could of the ticker tape parade for the NY Giants. Which turned out to be not much, since the crowd was about 50 deep from the street, but I still enjoyed the watching the fluttering debris and hearing the roar of the crowd when something exciting happened. Our venerable Mayor Bloomberg had urged people, “If you have an office along Broadway, you are encouraged to throw confetti out your windows … just don’t throw anything heavy out the window — paper only," and it was really funny to see what must have been raided from copiers and printers floating through the air, as well as rolls of toilet paper floating gently down a 20 story office building. I did see said mayor as he passed by on one of those double decker sightseeing bus, but he was the only I could recognize from as far away as I was (although, not going to lie, being closer up certainly wouldn't have made a difference...) So yes, fun times, but it was time to make our way back to the office for another day. Unfortunately I don't think I got any great pictures. Confetti doesn't photograph especially well.

Tomorrow is my last day of work for the week, because I get to go to Seattle for a conference on homelessness! I'm so excited!

New Operation to Put Heavily Armed Officers in Subways

I find this incredibly scary...

HOPE 2008

So, the previously mentioned HOPE count took place this Monday night. The city was divided into districts and volunteers were assigned to certain tracts within each district to survey. Supposedly, the NYC count is one of the most statistically sound counts in the country, but I don't know all the details about what makes it such, although I know it does have to do with how the tracts are selected to be surveyed, and the presence of decoys to serve as controls. As a DHS employee, I got to our base school at around 9:00 to set up for the volunteers. When the 30-some volunteers arrived at 11:00, we gave them a brief training on the rules. The basic gist of the evening is to give the survey to everyone you see on the street who is not actively working.

The survey asks 1. Is there someplace you call home that you are returning to tonight? 2. What type of dwelling is that place (apt/house/room/public space/abandoned building/etc) 3. Has anyone else asked you these questions tonight? You are supposed to ask everyone, because you can't really tell what's what on looks alone (and to make sure you find the decoys!). If you do find people who are homeless, you offer them a ride to the shelter intake facility (there were vans on call for this purpose). If they did not want to go, and didn't seem in danger, you just thanked them and handed them an outreach card with contact info if they should change their mind.

I went out in Bushwick, Brooklyn with fellow Fellow Ryan, our team leader Michelle and a police escort. I did most of the talking, which involved stopping those in the street, introducing myself and doing the survey. Now keep in mind, these questions are being asked to people between midnight and 2:00am. DHS does its best to publicize, but no one we talked to that night had any idea what we were doing. Only one guy refused to answer though, and we talked to around 25 people. We got some really confused looks, though, especially when we asked if anyone else had already asked them these questions.

Having a police officer with us made for an interesting dynamic. The officers were supposed to be out in pairs, and be trailing us a bit, but ours stayed close to us, which I think made a lot of the participants nervous. I don't blame them! We found one homeless guy, who told us he was a vet and had been living in a very abandoned building by the Long Island RR track for several years. He wanted to get back on his feet but didn't want to go into the shelter system. We didn't find any decoys, which wasn't unusual, but somehow we still felt like we'd missed something.

By the time we finished, I was frozen to the bone, and the night wasn't even that cold, I was only out for three hours and I was moving the whole time. I could never hack it as homeless in NYC in the winter. I don't know how people do it. What I enjoyed most was seeing the city from a completely different angle - I'm never out that late in that kind of neighborhood specifically looking for that kind of population. It was very, very interesting. Next year, I think I'd like to participate as a decoy.

Anyway, that's that. The rest of the week was eventful as well, as I attended at debate at the 92 Street Y about the existence of God, ate at a french bakery and listened to a folk singer/songwriter on the LES. That, my friends, is why I continue to love New York, although I do have to remind myself sometimes on days like today when it's cold, wet and windy.

Here's to a great weekend,

Chevy Chase and counting the homeless

So in an attempt (although, rather feeble) to keep up with my celebrity-spotting friends, I have to report that Erika and I braved the cold on MLK weekend to get tickets for our usual holiday visit to Upright Citizens Brigade (the standup comedy place) on Sunday night. And I mean, it was cold! Felt like 8 degrees! Being the veteran line sitters that we are, we decked out in longjohns and huddled under blankets for an hour, and it payed off, because the guest monologuist was Chevy Chase! So that was fun, although he actually put on a really bad performance. It was like the poor man was having a stroke, really, but the rest of the regular cast didn't seem to mind, and they were funny anyway.

Coming up this week is the annual DHS HOPE count, which is the annual census of street homeless. Over 2,500 volunteers go out the night of Jan. 28, and I'm going to be counting with a team of people from my division in Brooklyn. It should be interesting, more on that later... In the meantime, a short blurb from Time Out New York.

A semi-depressing NYTimes article

Makes you really want to read it, huh...

"A program specifically for working families, would pay up to $1,130 a month for a two-bedroom apartment for one year. Families would be expected to pay $50 a month toward rent and would be encouraged to save up to 20 percent of the actual rent.

By year’s end, he said, the city would match the savings as well as their $600 in rent contributions. An extra year would be allowed for those who were still shaky. He estimated that a family could have $10,000 by the end of the second year."

This program is what I am working on.

In a desperate bid to add more spice, some holiday pictures:

Self portrait of the fam. They had never done the "cram as many people as possible into the shot that someone takes with one hand" thing. I learned from a pro...
My nephew, the pilot.
Evan got Gulpin' Guppies for Christmas. What a great game...
Roommate Kathleen returned (and brought a friend) for some New Years and post holiday fun.

Happy New Year!

You might have noticed my lack of posts. I think I have a cross between the winter blues and blogger envy of my friends who are writing from far away and exotic locales. Actually, there just hasn't been a whole lot going on.

My second NYE in NYC (as I found out New Year's Eve, apparently, is called these days) was spent overlooking the park where we toiled last year to run four miles at the stroke of midnight. The plans this year were a little more relaxing, as fellow Fellow Lesley lives right by the park and has a rooftop perfect for midnight firework viewing. We hung out at her place and at five to midnight, we found ourselves scrambling up 21 flights of stairs to reach the roof before the big moment, because the elevators were too full to fit in. The view of Central Park and all the people below was amazing - at midnight we could hear the crowd roaring. The fireworks were great too (aren't they always?) and then, there was a brawl. Yes, a brawl, on the rooftop of a private apartment building in one of the poshest areas in town. I honestly thought someone was going to be thrown off the roof or killed with a bottle or deck chair to the head. Someone called the cops and in the meantime we got the heck out of there, missing the grand finale. What is wrong with people??? The rest of the night was pleasant, though, as Ryan and I made our way toward Grand Central Station to meet the roommates, who were hanging out in the pub where the local bartender from last year in Queens now makes his living.

Before New Years I met with my aunt Jeanne and cousin Jennifer, who were in town for the holidays, before they ironically left the next day to visit my home in Ohio. We had pizza with my OTHER cousin Glen, who lives in NYC and works at the statue of liberty.

I'm sorry this post is pretty boring. They might be for a while, I think we're in the winter doldrums, although the burst of warm weather this week was a nice taste of spring. Here's to more of that!