Promise Neighborhoods Gets $30-Million in Budget Deal

Editor’s Note: This story is part of an ongoing series.

The D.C. Promise Neighborhood Initiative, one of 21 projects that received federal money last fall to help plan antipoverty projects modeled after Harlem Children’s Zone, has been working to flesh out its vision while also fretting about the fate of the federal program.

A long budget impasse in Washington left that fate uncertain until this month, when Congressional leaders and President Obama agreed to spend $30-million on Promise Neighborhoods projects in 2011.

That is far less than the $210-million that President Obama proposed, but more than the $10-million that lawmakers had been mulling. “It takes a little pressure off,” says Irasema Salcido, head of the Washington project.

The Department of Education still has to work out details about the size and timing of the next round of awards, but the money is expected to pay for some of the 21 groups to carry out their projects and for newer recipients to plan new Promise Neighborhoods.

Ms. Salcido, founder of the César Chávez Public Charter Schools for Public Policy, says the Washington effort, which won a $500,000 grant in 2010, is not sure yet how much it will seek in its next grant request. But planners are working with potential donors to ensure the group can raise the matching funds that are required to win the government grant.

The project raised more than $1-million in money and donated services in 2010—far more than the 50-percent match needed to qualify for the first grant.

If it wins more money to carry out the project, it will have to match every federal dollar with money from other sources. The D.C. project has raised more than $200,000 in cash since it won its first grant.