BFC In the News

So which is it?

Does the $13.8 billion 2018 budget submitted to the D.C. Council by Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) reflect, as she asserts, the ideas and priorities of D.C. residents?

A good question. The final answer rests with the D.C. Council, which, in the budget-making process, is always a crapshoot.

As Mayor Muriel Bowser's slogan “Pathways to the Middle Class” has morphed into “Inclusive Prosperity,” her budget has something for every social advocacy group to dislike, and a business tax cut that should go a long way towards aiding her re-election effort. It also portends a season of political theater that places D.C.’s class divide in high relief, as presidential and congressional prerogatives pose existential threats to the District’s neediest residents.

It can be in a doctor’s tone when asking a routine medical question, or in the way a nurse raises an eyebrow. The stigma surrounding HIV can be exhausting.

The clinic tries to respond to whatever legal needs our clients present. That's meant that over the years I've had the opportunity to directly represent or assist thousands of individual clients with a wide variety of issues.

A crowd gathered in front of the Wilson building on Monday, Feb. 6 to voice their outrage in response to emergency legislation that had been introduced by Ward 7 Councilmember and former mayor Vincent C. Gray. His proposed Police Officer Recruitment and Retention Act, introduced Jan. 10, aimed to retain and increase the ranks of the Metropolitan Police Department

The demonstrators rallied against the increase of police presence in D.C.’s Black communities. They held signs stating “D.C. Spends More Money on Policing and Prisons than we do on Public Schools,” “#FundBlackFutures” and “Police are Supposed to Serve and Protect not Judge and Kill.”

Top Chef star and DC restaurateur Spike Mendelsohn and George Jones, CEO of Bread for the City, discuss strengthening public services in an effort to create jobs & feed families. In their respective roles – as the head of one of the most successful safety nets for the poor people of DC and as the chairman of the DC Food Policy Council – George and Spike see how resourceful families struggle to feed, clothe, and shelter a family with three children for less than $18 per day.

WASHINGTON/YORK, PENNSYLVANIA —
Uncertainty.

It's a state Dr. Monica Vohra says many of her low-income, mainly immigrant and minority patients are in when they arrive at Bread for the City's free medical clinic in Washington, D.C.

But lately, the internal medicine physician says that state has been heightened.

This week, we jump on the phone with Sekou Murphy, Chief Financial Officer of Bread for the City, a non profit in Washington DC dedicated to helping the city’s most vulnerable citizens break the cycle of poverty.

We talk about how he has focused on helping his staff improve their own personal finances so they can be better serve Bread for the City’s clients, how poverty affects your psyche and what the non profit does to overcome these barriers, and why financial literacy education is so important at such a young age.