01> Moving to Opportunity After Katrina - A Scholar's Petition
In the terrible wake of Hurricane Katrina, New Vision and hundreds of university professors across the nation identified an historic opportunity to lift thousands of the nation’s most vulnerable families out of ghetto poverty and the associated physical and social risks that Katrina has so vividly illustrated in recent weeks. As the nation seeks to find housing for the many who have been left homeless, our goal for these low-income displaced persons, most of whom are racial minorities, should be to create a “move to opportunity.” A growing body of scientific research indicates that moving to lower poverty, lower risk neighborhoods and school districts can have significant positive effects on the well-being and economic opportunity of low-income children and their families. We urge the President and Congress, working with state and local leaders, nonprofit and community groups, and the private sector, to seize this extraordinary opportunity to rebuild lives, not just the physical infrastructure. Thousands of families can come back stronger than before. The policy and program knowledge exist, and so does the operational capacity to implement this proposal effectively at scale. We urge America’s leaders to show the will and make this possible.