Dear New York Senators and Assembly Members:

We demand that you commit to protecting New York’s most vulnerable by refusing to cut critical services in our State budget that hundreds of thousands of children and families rely on every day. 

This means reversing the current withholding of State payments to communities, and fighting for a fair and just budget that holds children harmless in the face of State fiscal deficits.  We refuse to balance the State budget on the backs of vulnerable Black and Latinx children, whose families have already suffered disproportionately at the hands of the COVID-19 crisis.

The State’s recent 20 percent withholding in aid to localities funding to counties, schools and community-based providers has already disrupted the provision of services to New York’s children, just as they return to school and as communities struggle to meet increased needs due to the pandemic.  Further State budget cuts to youth-serving programs would have a disastrous impact on the health and well-being of our youngest New Yorkers.  During these unprecedented times, we must protect community-based child welfare and juvenile justice preventive services, diversion programs, income supports, Medicaid and critical child health programs - not cut them.

We thereby urge you to protect essential programs promoting health, well-being, resilience, family stability and community safety by refusing to cut critical services - either in current or future budgets - that our State’s children and youth desperately need, now more than ever.

(Read our recent letter to Governor Cuomo and New York’s legislative leadership, written with our State child advocacy partners, at http://bit.ly/ProtectingChildrenintheBudget.)