NEW YORK (AP) -- The city's experimental anti-poverty program that pays poor New Yorkers for good behavior like seeing the doctor and attending parent-teacher conferences handed out an average of $3,000 per family in its first year.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg's administration said it is too early to know whether it is a useful tool to fight poverty. Officials say it will take five years for a full evaluation of the program, which is the first of its kind in the nation.
But a report released Tuesday by the mayor's Center for Economic Opportunity did contain some preliminary data. It said 80 percent of the 2,400 participating families are described as ``fully engaged'' in the program, while 16 percent are ``less engaged'' and four percent have not completed any of the activities.
The program pays poor families rewards, known as conditional cash transfers, for completing tasks like seeing a doctor ($200), attending parent-teacher conferences ($25) or getting health insurance ($40).
The concept was modeled after similar efforts in other countries, including Mexico, Turkey and Brazil.
``We're trying conditional cash transfers in a very different setting, to find out if they work in urban America,'' Bloomberg said. ``Will they succeed? We'll find out _ that will take time. Has it been controversial? Sure, but so is every policy that breaks new ground.''
In New York City, the experiment is privately funded; the city handed out a total of $6.6 million in the program's first year, from September 2007 to August 2008. A control group of 2,400 families are also being monitored for five years but are not receiving payments.
All of the participating families in New York have household incomes at or below 130 percent of the federal poverty level; in 2007, when families began receiving rewards, that was equal to $22,301 for a family of three.
Bloomberg created the Center for Economic Opportunity in 2006 to examine and fight poverty in New York City, which has a poverty rate of 18 percent.
He traveled to Washington on Tuesday to brief the Obama administration on which efforts have been working, and which ones he is discontinuing.
Bloomberg said the poverty panel is cutting six initiatives that either weren't producing results or have run their course. In addition to the cash rewards program, 11 other efforts are considered successful or promising and will be continued.
One initiative being cut is a literacy program for young people who have recently been released from prison. The mayor says it failed to improve the skills of a sufficient number of participants.
According to the poverty report he released Tuesday, the goal of that program was to initially serve 100 people, with 18 or more students improving their literacy. But of the 23 that ended up participating, just four made gains.
One program that is said to be working: the city analyzes past federal tax information to identify New Yorkers eligible for the Earned Income Tax Credit, a credit for low-income working families.
The Department of Finance then fills out and mails amended tax returns so that people can claim the money.
In 2008, this program helped an estimated 4,300 households get $3.6 million, with an average benefit of $840.
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