Creating widespread economic opportunity in the Bay Area, especially for communities of color, requires a better understanding of what a decent standard of living actually costs in our region. The commonly used federal poverty measure vastly understates poverty in high-cost places like California. This means that many more families than commonly estimated are left without support, and struggle to meet their most basic needs.
The Real Cost Measure, developed by the United Ways of California, factors the costs of housing, food, health care, child care, transportation and other basic needs to determine what it really costs to live in communities across the state. Their 2018 report found that one in three households in California do not earn enough income to meet basic needs, and households led by people of color struggle at higher rates. In our rapidly changing Bay Area, high housing costs have pushed many low-income people of color out to high poverty neighborhoods in Contra Costa and Solano counties, where resources and infrastructure are not sufficient to meet needs. We can and must do more to identify and implement policies and programs that can lift California’s huge number of struggling households out of poverty and create an inclusive economy that works for everyone.
Join the Community Development Department at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco and Northern California Grantmakers to learn about the Real Cost Measure, the accompanying interactive tools, and what the data tells us about poverty in the Bay Area. Join us and our distinguished panelists in a conversation about what it takes to make ends meet in our region and state, and the roles we can play in creating widespread economic opportunity in the Bay Area.
Speakers
Kelly Batson, Senior Vice President, Community Impact, United Way Bay Area
Caroline Danielson, Policy Director and Senior Fellow, Public Policy Institute of California
Caroline Danielson is a policy director and senior fellow at the Public Policy Institute of California. Her research focuses on multiple dimensions of the social safety net, including its role in mitigating poverty, program access and enrollment, and the integration and governance of programs. Her work has been published in numerous academic journals, including the Journal of Policy Analysis and the Social Service Review. Before coming to PPIC, she was a principal analyst at the University of California’s Welfare Policy Research Project and a faculty member in the Department of Politics at the State University of New York, Potsdam. She holds a PhD in political science from the University of Michigan and a master’s degree in policy analysis from the Pardee RAND graduate school.
Henry Gascon, Director, Program and Policy Development, United Ways of CaliforniaHenry Gascon is Director, Program and Policy Development at United Ways of California. In this role, Gascon conducts policy research and analysis, leads communication strategies and assists with organizational operations. He is a co-author of Struggling to Get By: The Real Cost Measure in California 2015 which introduces a new poverty measure that conveys the true cost of living in California's communities and has promotes the Human Development Index, which discusses well-being in health, education and financial stability.
Previously, Gascon was a Policy Analyst at Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority and the Director of NPower Los Angeles, a social service organization that provided technology education services for the Southern California nonprofit sector. He holds Bachelor degrees in History and International Relations from Holy Names University in Oakland, California and a Master’s in Public Administration specializing in policy analysis from the Robert F. Wagner School of Public Service at New York University.
John Moon, Director, Community Development, Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco (moderator)
John Moon manages the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco’s community development department. The team supports a wide range of initiatives that address the needs of low-income communities and individuals throughout the Fed’s nine-state western region. Facilitating financing/investing, supporting multi-sector collaboratives, and focusing on larger systems barriers in lower-income urban and rural markets are a particular focus of the team. John has extensive social change experience in the public and private sectors including work at Living Cities, the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, U.S Treasury’s CDFI Fund, the City of Seattle, Federal Home Loan Bank of Seattle, Fleetbank, and the Los Angeles Philharmonic. John has also advanced national community development programs and policies, including those involving social investments, healthy communities, racial equity, and climate resilience. He has also published articles and papers and spoken nationally on these topics. John earned his Bachelor’s degree from UCLA and a Master’s in Public Policy from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.
Vera A. Moore, Vice President, Community Relations Manager, Office of Nonprofit Engagement, JPMorgan Chase & Co.
Vera A. Moore is a Vice President in the Office of Nonprofit Engagement (ONE) at JPMorgan Chase & Co. Vera works closely with community advocates and JPMorgan Chase senior leaders to build initiatives and relationships that advance access to opportunity and economic mobility. Prior to joining JPMorgan Chase, Vera served as the Director of the Urban Youth Empowerment Program at the National Urban League, where she oversaw a $10 million workforce development, education, and training program targeted to Opportunity Youth living in high-poverty, high-crime communities nationwide. She also managed the Consulting and Technical Assistance Division at Seedco, where she provided capacity building services to foundations, government agencies and nonprofit organizations focused on workforce development, asset building and work supports. A former Manhattan Borough President’s Office Community Planning Fellow, Vera holds a Master’s of Urban Planning from New York University’s Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service and a Bachelor’s of Arts from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). In 2015, Vera completed a competitive fellowship with Coro Leadership New York. She also completed the African American Board Leadership Institute’s Board Leadership Program in 2018.
Solana Rice, Co-Founder & Co-Executive Director, Liberation in a Generation
Solana Rice is a dedicated advocate aiming to shape the most vibrant, inclusive, and sustainable economy this country has seen. As Co-Founder and Co-Executive Director of Liberation in a Generation, she is using her over a decade of focus on building wealth and financial security for low-income families to create a new worldview to fuel a vibrant network of political organizing groups poised to advance policy agendas that center racial disparities in wealth. This is all in service of making it possible to achieve economic liberation for people of color within a generation.
Prior to starting Liberation in a Generation, Solana was Director of State & Local Policy at Prosperity Now where under her leadership, she built strong advocacy partnerships with organizations in the field and advanced dozens of policies in nearly half the states in the nation. Prior to joining Prosperity Now, Solana served as a director for financial security initiatives at PolicyLink. Solana has a Master's in City Planning from MIT, where she researched the integration of individual development accounts into community development services. She holds a B.A. in architecture from Washington University in St. Louis.