Jesuit Journeys
Winter 2007

Social and International Ministries:
Budget cuts hurt inner-city hardest

John Sealey
Provincial Assistant For Social and International Ministries

An empty outdoor swimming pool can conjure a barren winter landscape simultaneously beckoning our past memories as well as our yearnings for warmer days. Sadly for Milwaukee County, many pools may have padlocked their gates for the final time. With three children ages 10 and younger, I find this development disappointing but instructive.

The county executive leadership which seems to enshrine a “no-new tax” fundamentalism coupled with the certitude that privatization is the one-size-fits-all solution to such problems. The preliminary county parks budget (ironically delivered during a summer heat wave) would moth-ball 43 of Milwaukee’s 47 public pools. In November, the county board re-instated some of the pools set for closure which was met with a veto by the county executive. Like most cuts to human services, these losses will be shouldered largely by inner-city children with few summer recreational outlets.

Deteriorating parks are simply one indicator of the entrenched poverty facing our Midwestern towns and cities. According to the 2004 U.S. Census, “The American Midwest and South saw the greatest numbers of people entering poverty in 2004; the number in the Midwest rose from 6.9 million to 7.5 million.” In that measure, Milwaukee ranked as the 7th poorest city in the U.S. with more than 143,000 or 26% of the population living in poverty. In 1970, 11% of Milwaukeeans lived in poverty.

This downward trend did have a respite during the 1990’s when poverty rates actually showed improvement due to the earned income tax credit. However these modest gains have been lost over the past six years. Even more alarming is Milwaukee’s fourth place ranking in childhood poverty at 41.3%.

While swimming pool closure can be an imprecise measure, other metrics tell a similar story. Income: UWM reports a 78% decline in income supports for inner-city families from 1994-2003. The Pew Research Center indicates that 83% of Americans favor an increase in minimum wage, yet congressional efforts to raise the minimum wage were defeated last summer. Conversely, CEO pay is now 262 times that of an average worker, while in 1978 this was a multiple of 35.

Housing: HUD measures show that overcrowded households in Milwaukee have increased 76% since 1980 and Milwaukee is in need of 28,000 housing units for extremely low income families.

Health Care: The Commonwealth Fund reports that since 2000, employers offering workplace coverage declined from 69% to 60% in 2005. By 2013, an estimated 28% of workers will be underinsured.

Education: Nationally, classrooms with 75% or more minority students are also 40% more likely to be overcrowded. Teacher attrition is 33% more frequent in high poverty schools. Those teaching subjects different than their major are 77% more likely in high-poverty classrooms. In short schools are increasingly re-segregating by race and poverty. (Source: Children’s Defense Fund)

Led by the 10 U.S. Jesuit provincials, Jesuits and Jesuit ministries are currently discerning future apostolic planning and appropriate responses to the Call of Christ. The meditation invites reflection on Jesus’ identification with the least and his identification with them in their suffering. The reader is invited to feel the sense of entrapment felt by those who live in structurally entrenched poverty which can seem inescapable. “When we labor in solidarity with the least of our brothers and sisters, it is not merely a work of justice. It is a matter of faith. It is a matter of whether we believe in Him whose name we bear.” (From “A Meditation on our response to the call of Christ”)

Human service cuts portrayed as “extras” on a municipal parks or education budget can dramatically affect the quality of life for the entrenched poor. At the end of fall, the Dow has hit another record and the Associated Press reported on the most recent census figures, “Decades after the civil rights movement, racial disparities in income, education and home ownership persist and, by some measurements, are growing.”

Moral authorities from Pope John Paul II to Mahatma Gandhi have taught us that a nation’s greatness is measured by how it treats its weakest members. If a nation as abundantly blessed as the U.S., passively allows such inequities to persist and even worsen, we must begin to ask if we have the will to change.