Poor people can't wait

The criticism that the city election has been too focused on funding public schools underestimates the impact of a poorly educated population on other issues, especially poverty. It is true, however, that better schools won't immediately make the poor wealthy. So what else the mayoral candidates would do to end Philadelphia's reign as America's poorest big city is important.

The candidates' answers to that question on today's op-ed page often state the obvious: The city needs more jobs. A retooled tax system could help to lure more of those jobs. More Philadelphians must be better educated to make them worth hiring.

Republican Melissa Murray Bailey also says employers should be incentivized through tax breaks to train new workers. Among the Democrats, Lynne Abraham says the city must revamp schools and raise the minimum wage. Nelson Diaz says schools should provide social services to address family issues that impede education. Jim Kenney wants community development corporations to encourage entrepreneurship. Doug Oliver says the city should help start-up businesses and focus on manufacturing.

Only Anthony Williams, after also touting the need for tax changes and better schools, says he would expand the Mayor's Office of Community Empowerment and Opportunity and its Shared Prosperity Philadelphia program. Shared Prosperity is a way to help poor people now instead of waiting for the schools to start graduating more students with knowledge beyond recognizing which sandwich key to punch on a cash register.

It wasn't until 2013 that Mayor Nutter decided the depth of poverty in Philadelphia required more direct involvement and created Shared Prosperity. But the program has already made an impact by coordinating the efforts of the myriad of organizations and agencies that try to get immediate help to families who qualify for Medicaid, food stamps, job training, and other assistance.

Shared Prosperity has set up six outreach offices called BenePhilly centers inside existing community organizations' facilities. Community Empowerment executive director Eva Gladstein says the centers so far have helped more than 4,700 applicants obtain $3.3 million in benefits. One area where the program is making a difference is in assisting the 300,000 formerly incarcerated city residents who need training and counseling to become better prospective employees.

The program, funded solely by federal and other grants, should be a line item in the next mayor's budget. That's not the long-term solution to Philadelphia's 26.3 percent poverty rate, which includes 60,000 children living in "deep poverty" who are more likely to develop cognitive and emotional problems. But while taxes, school funding, and minimum wages are being debated, poor people need the immediate assistance that Shared Prosperity provides.