RMAPI Email on Poverty Decline Misses Mark
Never celebrate a decline in poverty or crime without knowing what actions led to the change.
This week, the Rochester-Monroe Anti-Poverty Initiative (RMAPI) sent out an email with exciting news: Rochester's poverty rate has dropped to its lowest point in more than a decade. According to U.S. Census data, the federal poverty rate in our city is now 26.6%, marking a decline from 33.8% (described as a 20% drop in the email) since RMAPI's founding ten years ago. It’s an achievement worth celebrating—but is it the full story?
As RMAPI celebrates its 10-year anniversary, the organization has a clear motive to promote this statistic. Since its inception in 2015, RMAPI—housed at the United Way—has received an astonishing $16.4 million in state funding.
As someone deeply committed to addressing poverty, I want to celebrate progress. However, it’s essential to dig deeper and ask hard questions about what these numbers truly mean—and what they don’t.
Why Did Poverty Decline?
As with crime, it’s risky to celebrate declines in poverty without clearly identifying the specific policies or actions that drove measurable change. RMAPI doesn’t point to any specific initiatives or actions that it took resulting in this decline. Instead, it broadly credits collaboration, stating that it “worked closely with dozens of other organizations, elected officials, community members, and advocacy groups.” Collaboration is commendable, but it doesn’t clarify what actually worked.
Rochester’s progress also needs to be placed within a larger context. Poverty rates have dropped nationwide in recent years, driven by macroeconomic trends, pandemic-related federal relief programs, and other structural factors. While Rochester’s decline is notable, it aligns with this broader national trajectory. It remains unclear to what extent local initiatives—such as RMAPI’s work—uniquely contributed to the outcome.
Furthermore, Rochester still ranks fifth in the nation for childhood poverty. While the poverty rate has declined, it hasn’t fallen far enough compared to other cities to move us out of the top ten.
Demographic changes also complicate the picture. For example, Rochester’s population of children under 18 has significantly decreased over the last decade. In 2015, children made up 25% of the city’s population, but by 2023, that figure had dropped to 20%. Similarly, the percentage of households with children fell from 29% to 21%. These shifts likely influenced poverty statistics and merit closer examination.
Additionally, poverty among families in Rochester shows little improvement in key areas. For households with children under 5, the poverty rate only dropped from 42% in 2015 to 39% in 2023. Among households with three or four children, the poverty rate declined from 60% to 57%—a marginal change over nearly a decade.
Other Data Points
While the federal poverty rate offers some insight, the deeply flawed metric doesn’t tell the whole story. Other data suggests that economic hardship may be worsening for many families. The Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM)—a more comprehensive metric accounting for housing costs, geographic variations, and government assistance—revealed a nationwide uptick between 2022 and 2023.
In the Rochester metro area, the SPM for a family of four (two adults and two children who rent) is $35,556—115% of the official poverty line. Nearly one-third of families in Rochester live below 125% of the poverty line, highlighting widespread financial insecurity.
Other local data paints an equally sobering picture: homelessness in Monroe County increased by 32% last year, and evictions are up nearly 10%. The number of families receiving temporary assistance in Monroe County increased 6% from October 2023 to October 2024, For many families, economic stability is not improving—it’s deteriorating.
We cannot ignore the growing crisis among our youth. Absenteeism in the City School District is alarmingly high, and more teenagers are engaging in dangerous behaviors, such as stealing cars. These trends are clear signs of families grappling with instability and unmet needs.
RMAPI acknowledged in its email, “We know that there is still much work to be done and that upward mobility will not come through poverty reduction alone.” But this raises the question: what exactly are we celebrating, and why?
RMAPI’s Role
I’ve long believed RMAPI was created under then-Assemblyman Joe Morelle to give politicians a way to appear proactive on poverty without committing to transformative policies, while also creating a network of individuals reliant on them for jobs. Back in 2017, I wrote a blog expressing skepticism about RMAPI’s ability to drive meaningful change. Unfortunately, I’ve been proven right. RMAPI has essentially become an advocacy group funded by the state to lobby the state1—a dynamic that raises serious questions about its effectiveness and independence.
Meanwhile, independent advocacy groups that champion similar issues, such as state housing vouchers, do so without being beholden to elected officials or reliant on state funding. This distinction is critical: when state housing vouchers failed to make it into the budget, RMAPI still applauded the budget as a success. The organization seems unable—or unwilling—to hold accountable the very officials who fund its operations, perpetuating a conflict of interest that undermines its advocacy.
What Can Be Done Locally?
There’s no question that state and federal governments have far greater capacity to address poverty than local governments. We already know what works: the pandemic-era child tax credits nearly halved national child poverty, and the state’s Child Poverty Reduction Advisory Council recently proposed evidence-based recommendations that should be implemented.
That said, meaningful action can still happen at the local level. Guaranteed income programs, progressive housing policies, and improving social services delivery are all ways to make a tangible difference. However, few nonprofits, including RMAPI, hold local leaders—like the mayor or county executive—accountable for progress on these issues. Many organizations, including RMAPI’s parent, the United Way, rely on local government funding, creating a dynamic where advocacy is tempered by financial dependence.
Even more concerning is RMAPI’s recent initiative to train residents as “civic influencers” while providing access to life coaching. While some may find value in these offerings, the underlying message is troubling. It perpetuates the harmful myth that people facing financial hardship are somehow at fault for their circumstances and need RMAPI’s guidance to succeed. Moreover,the implication seems to be that poverty could be solved if only people knew how to contact their representatives—a simplistic and dismissive notion.
This narrative shifts the focus away from systemic barriers and structural inequities, placing undue responsibility on individuals while justifying RMAPI’s bureaucracy.
Setting Stage for Status Quo
RMAPI’s email celebrating progress risks reinforcing the status quo. The danger of this announcement lies in the potential for local leaders to say, “I’m helping because I’m funding RMAPI and working with the group on issues,” even though there’s no clear evidence of what RMAPI has actually accomplished to improve the lives of Rochesterians during its existence.
Moreover, this is a particularly troubling moment to celebrate progress on poverty. We are clearly seeing signs of economic stress in Rochester. In addition, everyone from experts to Trump’s own voters are bracing for potential cuts to the social safety net under the new federal administration—changes that could significantly increase poverty rates and economic hardship for families across the country.
The bottom line is that RMAPI’s email celebrating progress was self-serving and overly simplistic, potentially causing harm by promoting an incomplete and possibly outdated narrative.
The United Way of Greater Rochester and the Finger Lakes has contracted in recent years with Ostroff Associates, which employs Rep. Joe Morelle’s son as a lobbyist. Nicholas Morelle is listed as a lobbyist on the account. Ostroff appears to be providing services pro bono to obtain funds for the nonprofit in the state budget. United Way has not only secured funds for RMAPI, but it received $5 million for general expenses in the 2024-2025 budget.
This is my extremely cynical take: Ostroff is a top campaign contributor to Rep. Morelle. Ostroff keeps a congressman happy by helping out the United Way, and the congressman gets to keep his creation, RMAPI, funded. Meanwhile, we have no idea where funding is going and no one has to do anything to solve poverty.