CEI Blog

Part of what inspired me to create the Community Empowerment Initiative was the observation that longstanding federal policy toward ending poverty yielded—at best—the most marginal of improvements.  

Here in Washington, far too often we focus our attention and resources on the funding levels of federal programs rather than on their effect on the people that we serve. And while these programs provide a useful and often essential service to those most in need, in President Lyndon Johnson’s fifty-three-year-long “War on Poverty,” the poverty rate has fallen only five percent – from 19% in 1964 to 14% in 2015.  When the data indicate little to no achievement, it’s time to move past antiquated ideas and begin implementing innovative and effective strategies to combat poverty.

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