Under the coordination of the EndPovertyNOW Campaign, a broad group of advocacy organizations, including The Legal Aid Society, are urging Governor Hochul to increase Cash Assistance grant levels for New Yorkers in need as part of this year’s budget.

Rates for basic needs and rent assistance, both key pieces of New York’s statutory safety net, have not been updated in decades.

The basic needs allowance is designed to help people pay for necessities like clothing,
diapers, hygiene products, over the counter medication, and transportation. But because the
basic needs allowance has not been updated since 2011, and has never kept pace with inflation,
it is woefully inadequate to cover these essential expenses.

New Yorkers also desperately need an increase in the rent assistance available to cash assistance recipients. The current amounts are so low that there are literally zero habitable rental units priced at the level of the shelter allowance anywhere in New York State in the private market. They have not been updated for families with children since 2003 and adult-only households since 1988.

Raising the rates of Cash Assistance “will immediately help lift affected New Yorkers out of deep poverty in every community comprising our great state,” a letter from the coalition reads in part. “Increasing payments in cash assistance programs is an investment in our neighbors and sets us on the path to alleviating poverty now in the most effective and straightforward way possible.”