Governor releases 2010 budget

With the use of the words ‘budget cut’ in just about every sentence spoken in the Public Policy arena these days, one could get pretty easily discouraged. As he is required to do, Governor Patrick releases an annual state budget proposal every year in January. This year, we held our breath waiting to see what the projected budget would be for the coming year. What we found was bittersweet. The overall FY2011 budget was increased by three percent, after two previous cuts, where some programs had been cut completely or reduced more than 60-70 percent in order to make up part of the state’s $3 billion dollar structural deficit.

As I look at the absence of the Early Educators Scholarship Program, the significant cuts to youth violence prevention grants, the maintenance of cuts to mentoring and out-of-school-time grants, teen jobs and school-to-career connecting activities, the near 40 percent cut to the Employment Service Program (resulting in an estimated loss of approximately 3,500 slots), and the virtual elimination of the Residential Assistance for Families in Transition (RAFT) program I can’t help but just stand in amazement. I have been blessed to have never seen such an economically troubling time in my entire existence.

Knowing that there isn’t much the state can do since it’s required to pass a balanced budget, my mind turns to the people affected by these cuts. It’s easy for me and anyone else on the side of the assistance to be so far removed that we don’t have a clue as to the kind of pain that those on the would-be receiving end are experiencing right now. Even if we do understand the gravity of it, what can be done in an economic climate such as this one?

With such hard hitting questions, I often ask “why me?” Why have I been spared this kind of pain (at least spared to this point). With nearly one in ten people in Massachusetts using a food pantry, soup kitchen or shelter over the past four years, (accounting for 23 percent increase), and with all of the pain and destruction in Haiti and all over the world, I often sit around thinking about how my life could easily be so different. How, there really is no difference between myself and someone who has lost their job or fallen on hard times and is living on the streets. The only difference is my set of circumstances. Had I been born in China, I’d most likely have grown up in an orphanage because of having a cleft-lip and palette. But, I didn’t. I was born in an affluent country with access to excellent medical care. Yet even in this country I was fortunate. Not everyone has the privilege of growing up in such circumstances. It begs the question, “why me?”

After asking myself this for years now, I have finally come to the conclusion that the question “why me?” should be immediately followed up with the question “for what purpose?” and in my mind, that purpose is to be a blessing to others. To not be ashamed of where we grew up; whether in affluence or in poverty, but in every situation to use what we have whether in physical resource or act of love to better the lives of those around us.

In my experience so far, this has been a feat more easily “accomplished” when it comes in the form of immediate food assistance or help with clothing. Where it becomes a little more puzzling is in the work that must be done in the systems and with the people affected that takes not only money, but time, ingenuity, and a listening ear.

 Now, with a lack of both time and money on the part of agencies and individuals, many are having to make value decisions on which programs or people to serve and which ones to let go or cut back services from. It is an ethical issue and a value judgment of which I do not claim to know the answer. However, this is what I do know- if we look at our strengths, if we are willing to give of our resources, and if we stand humbly with each other drawing from a sense of community- learning from and strengthening each other, we will have done a greater service and made a difference in a deeper and more lasting way than if we simply had all of the money required to fund every program out there. After all, is it really love or service to give something that costs us nothing? Maybe it will be through alliances, creativity, and depth of character that our economy is truly helped. And to those individuals who are a place of affluence (which is many of us in this country) maybe it is time to stand in a place of conviction and acceptance of the fact that, “To whom much is given, much is required.”

 Though much of this sounds cliché, I can honestly tell you that after travelling to and living in places in our world that are literally the slums of the earth I have seen a deeper joy and strength of community than I have ever seen living in the wealthiest communities in America. It is this community that we need right now. We can’t depend solely on our government to fix all of our problems. We must all individually make a point to love those around us with a type of love that says, I will give to you even when it is not easy for me. I do not claim to have mastered this, but I know it exists. I have seen it in the dump of Guatemala City as a group of people who spend every day living, sleeping, and eating in the trash, bonded together, took whatever scraps of fabric they could find, compiled change they received from recycling, bought a broken down sewing machine and began to sew together pieces of garbage that appeared to be worth nothing to make beautiful purses and wallets out of them, selling what they could and giving one away to me, refusing to take anything for it, as a gift.