++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Cuts to Healthy Families New York Will Cost Us Dearly

Posted: 09 Feb 2011 12:36 PM PST on Prevent Child Abuse New York Blog

While I was happy to recently read about the successes Mt. Hope Family Center’s Building Healthy Children, a few days later the Governor’s budget proposal was revealed, and with it the complete elimination of funding for New York’s largest program that uses similar means to achieve similar outcomes.

The science of preventing negative childhood experiences, such as abuse, neglect and pre-term birth, before they happen is called primary prevention. Healthy Families New York has been a leading primary prevention program in New York state for sixteen years, and has fantastic data proving that mothers who enroll in it experience fewer low birth weight deliveries, lower rates of substance abuse and depression, and are less likely to abuse or neglect a child, even if they have abused or neglected a child in the past. After seven years, mothers who enroll in the program are less likely to have their child repeat a grade or receive special-education services, and they are more likely to have a child in a gifted program.

It is wonderful to give lip service to things like child abuse prevention and school readiness, but by eliminating funding to primary prevention programs, the governor’s budget actually costs us money in the short and long term. Healthy Families NY has been proven to save $50 in taxpayer money per family enrolled the year the family enrolls, and those savings increase as time goes by. The program has served between 4000-5000 families throughout the state in the last few years, so the savings are considerable. Leading economists have agreed that the best way to stimulate long-term economic growth is to invest in evidence-based early childhood programs such as Healthy Families NY.

In his race to close this year’s budget gap, the governor has managed to cut so deep as to lacerate a system that already saves us money. And he is doing it by dooming thousands of children to suffering needlessly throughout their lives.

++++

www.ted.comTED Talks Brene Brown studies human connection — our ability to empathize, belong, love. In a poignant, funny talk at TEDxHouston, she shares a deep insight from her research, one that sent her on a personal quest to know herself as well as to understand humanity

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++