Rise Up Cambridge: Half of eligible households signed up within the first 24 hours for cash aid
City Manager Yi-An Huang and Mayor Sumbul Siddiqui announcing Rise Up Cambridge on May 2 at City Hall. (Photo: Marc Levy)
There were more than 1,000 applications for Rise Up Cambridge within the program’s first 24 hours, representing around half of the families eligible for the cash payments, the City Manager’s Office said Friday.
The program, which began taking applications Thursday, will make $500 direct payments to families for 18 months starting June 30. The recipients are low-income Cambridge households with children 21 or younger and earning at or below 250 percent of the federal poverty level –some 7,000 people in a city of 120,000, according to a city analysis. Rise Up Cambridge is funded with $22 million from federal Covid-recovery money known as the American Rescue Plan Act.
Cambridge is the first city in the nation to introduce a non-lottery program to provide direct cash assistance to all eligible families, officials said.
Findings from earlier direct-payment programs show that recipients use the money largely on food, housing, transportation and utilities, U.S. Rep. Ayanna Pressley said during the May 2 announcement of the program in Cambridge City Hall.
“Every Cambridge resident deserves to have a basic level of economic stability,” City Manager Yi-An Huang said in a Friday press release. “Each family has unique needs and should be empowered to make their own financial decisions, whether related to education, child care, housing, food or just enjoying life’s moments.”
According to the Economic Policy Institute, a Washington, D.C., think tank, it costs $130,740 for a household with two parents and two children to live in Cambridge, while the federal poverty level for the same household is $13,000, said Geeta Pradhan, president of the Cambridge Community Foundation.
The foundation is a partner in Rise Up Cambridge with the city and Cambridge Economic Opportunity Committee. The executive director there, Tina Alu, noted that outreach teams are helping residents with the applications at sites across the city, and in eight languages.
“Rise Up will be deeply impactful for so many of our low-income families,” Mayor Sumbul Siddiqui said in the press release. “We are thrilled at the number of applications that came in on the first day of the program. The Rise Up team looks forward to working with our Cambridge families to improve their financial stability.”
Registration for Rise Up Cambridge is open through July 31. Information is at cambridgema.gov/riseup.
The American Rescue Plan Act funds were not supposed to be used for this. Why has Cambridge decided that it was okay to do so?
If the city wants to start Rise Up Cambridge, the city should allocate funds from the city budget.
I’m not sure the City is allowed to simply give out money. ARPA funds had less strings attached and it is easier to create a causal nexus. However I largely agree that this is a poor use of funds and should never have been approved. What happens when the funds inevitably run out? Is this essentially buying votes for politicians? What could we have done with $22M that could have helped mitigate other harms caused by our council and city during the pandemic? To my mind these funds and more should have gone to our neglected public school kids by way of scholarships. Instead they lost major events and were an afterthought through most of the painfully slow return to in person learning and as a chefs kiss to it all they lost the ability to take algebra in 8th grade.
Perhaps the funds could have been used to shore up the Community School’s after school programs instead of making parents join a lottery for admission. As a single parent I was dependent on these programs (and I paid for them for both my children.) I would not have been able to work and support my family as a single parent without these programs. Let’s talk about equity, Cambridge City Council, equity for ALL.
I think this is great. Let the families decide what’s the best use of the funds.
Lots of lawyers in here, apparently, who know better than the city or the feds how these funds are supposed to be used. It really reads like a lot of “but what about meeeeee….” From people over the threshold for this program.
You know the Chinese proverb: “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” It seems there could have been a more strategic application of $22 million, with a measurable long term benefit.
In truth, I’m surprised that only half of those eligible signed up the first day for no strings-attached cash.
@William F
You said “Lots of lawyers in here, apparently, who know better than the city or the feds how these funds are supposed to be used.”
It’s not the lawyers here who know better, it’s you who doesn’t know what the American Rescue Plan Act says.
Why don’t you read it before criticizing anyone.
I’m not sure what you’re reading William. However what I was suggesting is that our children paid the heaviest price during the pandemic and $22M could have done a lot more good in securing their futures through scholarships etc.