[WHEC] Child Poverty on the Rise in Rochester

from WHEC

Rochester leaders already know the poverty level is high, especially among children.

Rochester ranks first in the state in child poverty, and 11th in the nation.

Wednesday night Mayor Bob Duffy addressed Quad A For Kids, a program that's trying to stop the cycle of poverty in the flower city. The organization provides constructive afterschool programming for city kids, as a way to get them off the streets, but despite those efforts, local leaders know poverty in Rochester is still on the rise.

Adam McFadden is the head of Quad A. He says the first step to stopping the poverty cycle is to take care of the kids when they're outside of school.

“We've really been focusing our attention on after school programming specifically at school and that's been working well for us,” said McFadden.

The Superintendent of Rochester City Schools agrees poverty level students need support beyond the hours of the school day, but he says that's much of the student body in Rochester. Eighty percent of the students qualify for free or reduced lunch.

“Quad A provides that additional support for students, additional learning experiences that they might not receive elsewhere,” said Dr. Manuel Rivera.

Mayor Duffy believes it’s a combination of factors that, over time, will take the city off the top of the list when it comes to the number of poor kids.

“It’s about education, jobs and it’s about using a great level of accountability with the money we get and spend to try and address this,” said Mayor Duffy.

Foodlink distributes food to community agencies that in turn distribute it to the people. Foodlink officials said they have a broad overview of the poverty problem in Rochester and they say it's not getting any better.

“The rate of children that are eligible in the city to quality for our services and to received food from Foodlink is rapidly is increasing,” said Celeste Barkley, of Foodlink.

Mayor Duffy said Rochester was ranked second in the country for number of jobs lost, while Detroit was number one. The city also has one of the lowest graduation rates in the state. Mayor Duffy says these two factors must be turned around to get the poverty numbers down.