Hope and Healing: Part 2 - - From Enslaved to Entitled

President-Elect Barack Obama said he intends to go through the budget “line by line” and look at every expenditure and program. I would hope that our 44th President takes on this task with an eye toward fixing some fundamentals: equal access to quality education; employment that pays a living wage; and affordable housing. Addressing these fundamental issues is critical to making opportunity in America truly equal for all. Most people would not choose poverty; but absent quality education, marketable skills and employment, what’s the alternative?

But, before we go there, indulge me for a minute as I take a step back to give a bit more context on psychological healing….

What is it like to be born with the scarlet letter “N” branded onto your psyche? To be born with the historical constitutional stigma of being three-fifths of a person? What is it like to bear that legacy for over 200 years, in a country that preaches “one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all”, but largely practices “separate but not equal”?

And what is it like to finally rise up from beneath the weight of that legacy, to defy and discard it, and have one of you become President of the United States of America? What happens to the psyche of that 60% person, that citizen-of-sorts? What are the possibilities of affording yourself equal opportunities because, finally, you believe Yes, You Can?

I vividly recall being in my 3-year-old’s playgroup the day after the election, silently elated over President-Elect Obama’s victory, when Teddi walked in. She was elated as well, and she was not silent about it (nor is she black). It was a shared victory for Teddi and I. That victory was a signal that our democracy is finally becoming racially color blind. And I experienced a profound sense of hope and healing with the election of a President of the United States who is black. Not only did I feel proud to be an American, I felt like I was an American, whole and complete….

And now, feeling complete, let’s turn to the truly hard work: How do we address the structural challenges that contribute to cycles of poverty in our communities? Given that 37.3 million people in the US live in poverty, including 24.5% of African Americans, it will be interesting to see how and if President-Elect Obama addresses the issue.

I hope that President-Elect Obama will critically look at “entitlement programs” intended to provide assistance to the poor. I hope he modifies or eliminates those programs that are ineffective, replacing them with more forward-looking solutions. He is uniquely positioned to do so. As a youth, he was a benefactor of such programs. Moreover, he understands the psychological scars and the sociological challenges facing African Americans, a group heavily represented on the rolls.

Entitlement programs and other government assistance programs created a mindset of dependence and, well, entitlement, which we then scorned. We gave a man a fish, neither taught him how to fish for himself nor provided the tools that would enable self-sufficiency, then turned our noses up and called him "lazy".

The idea of public housing, for example, has merit. Unfortunately, in many cases it has created dens of poverty, crime and substandard living conditions that no one should endure. Ironically, I’ve seen individuals for whom the combination of familiarity and affordability was such a powerful draw that they chose to reside in public housing “where they lived their whole life”, even when offered a better option. And then there are people who simply have nowhere else to go. One need only look at the situation in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, where evacuees returned to boarded up housing projects even without basics such as electricity.

I admittedly am no expert on welfare programs, but for some welfare also created a mentality of dependence. Don't get me wrong. There are times when government assistance is not only helpful but necessary. After Hurricane Katrina, many members of my family found themselves homeless and jobless, local bank accounts frozen, with nothing but the clothes which they had worn when they evacuated. Some stood humbly in food stamp lines until they were able to get back on their feet and support themselves. But they got back on their feet.

The 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act signed by Bill Clinton is credited for "ending welfare". However, critics assail that it shifted families from welfare rolls to minimum wage jobs and did little to address poverty. We need a solution that does both.

With regard to education, it's no secret that school systems in low-income neighborhoods, many predominantly minority, are generally not the highest performing. According to the Gates Foundation, graduation rates for African-American, Hispanic, and low-income students hover just above 50 percent (compared to a 70 percent overall US graduation rate). As Professor Michael Eric Dyson says, “If the rigidly segregated educational system continues to miserably fail poor blacks by failing to prepare their children for the world of work, then admonitions to ‘stay in school’ may ring hollow.”

So here are a few “borrowed” ideas to kick around: Let’s phase out public housing as it exists today and replace it with mixed income communities. Peer pressure is a powerful motivator to raise your game, even for adults, as is exposure outside of your natural environment or comfort zone. Let’s look to programs such as the Gates model for creating schools that actually motivate students to learn – not more schools, just better results. Let’s scale the work of organizations such as Habitat for Humanity to move families from public housing to homeownership. (Habitat builds affordable houses with volunteer labor and sweat equity. The organization identifies families, many of whom reside in public housing, and provides them with 0-interest financing to purchase a home.)

Let’s identify and retool individuals who are structurally or otherwise unemployed and prepare them for higher paying jobs, jobs of the future, “green” jobs perhaps. Let’s stop assuming that people are poor because they are lazy, or, even worse, stop ignoring them all together. Most importantly, let’s capitalize on the psychological “high”, the “Yes We Can” spirit, brought by this election.

I believe the entitlement challenge is three-fold: structural, psychological and behavioral. The result of this election addressed the psychological barrier. Now let’s provide the structural resources that are necessary for individuals to break their cycle of poverty, namely, access to the quality education and training required to secure employment and earn a living wage. Finally, let’s model and make clear the behaviors required to become and remain self-sufficient as well as the near- and long-term rewards of doing so.

Many people will say that this is not the work of the government. Perhaps they're right, but I believe that government has a role. It’s a daunting task, no doubt, but one that is as critical as fixing our capital markets. (By the way, we also said that was not the work of the government.) If the government can spend $700 billion to address the needs of Wall Street albeit to protect Main Street, then it should also address the needs of the poor and the underprivileged.

In memory of Dr. Peter Daingerfield, whose life mission was to "teach a man to fish".