September 2005

Tens of thousands of low-income people were rendered hungry, homeless, and desparate by Hurricane Katrina because they had no means to evacuate and there was no plan to help them evacuate. The shameful failure to include low-income people and communities in the plans for evacuation and coping with the storm mirrors a national attitude of ignoring the poor across many issues.

The Leadership Council on Metropolitan Open Communities' long-awaited report concludes that the Chicago housing market skews access to opportunities for different population groups. Entitled The Segregation of Opportunities: The Structure of Advantage and Disadvantage in the Chicago Region, the report reinforces the need for much of the Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law's recent fair housing advocacy.

Internal Revenue Service data show that mostly low-income individuals and families are getting refund anticipation loans. As other states begin to regulate such loans charging interest rates of more than 200 percent, legislation is likely to be reintroduced in the Illinois General Assembly in the next session.

The number of people living in poverty in the United States grew by more than one million in 2004, according to the U.S. Census Bureau's annual poverty report, Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2004, released last month. Thirty-seven million Americans, 12.7 percent of the population, now live in poverty. Work was less effective as a means of escaping poverty in 2004 than ever before.

Despite the high demand for payday loans in low- and moderate-income communities, most mainstream financial institutions have not developed low-cost, short-term, small-dollar loans as an alternative to payday loans.

The Illinois Adequate Health Care Task Force will hold its first public hearing on October 5 in the first Illinois congressional district. Task force members will hear from the public about their health care access problems in Illinois and their ideas about how to structure a comprehensive health care access plan for Illinois.

Collaborative efforts address persistent problems encountered by different shelter residents in attempting to access public benefits through the local office. The positive outcomes of collaboration underscore the benefits of fostering understanding between state agencies and community organizations.