Mayors Advancing Economic Mobility Grant Opportunity Supports Efforts to Reduce Poverty and Strengthen Family Economic Stability in Communities
Washington, DC - Share Our Strength’s No Kid Hungry campaign is pleased to award the inaugural cohort of recipients for the Mayors Advancing Economic Mobility grant. The grant opportunity is a national grant pool open to active members of the Mayors Alliance to End Childhood Hunger (Mayors Alliance). The grant, which totals $175,000, focuses on two funding pathways: Municipal Child Tax Credit Planning and Economic Mobility Coaching.
Economic Mobility Coaching supports municipal planning efforts to plan the implementation of LIFT’s Economic Mobility Coaching model. Economic Mobility Coaching has demonstrated impact in strengthening family financial stability, reducing material hardship, and interrupting the link between poverty and hunger. But durable, population-level impact cannot come from isolated programs alone. Rather than asking families to navigate fragmented programs, LIFT works to ensure that economic mobility support is integrated into everyday touchpoints such as schools, healthcare settings, social services, and community institutions. This is an opportunity for mayors to shape the future of family economic mobility policy, locally and nationally.
Municipal Child Tax Credit Planning supports planning initiatives that assess the feasibility, design, and implementation pathways for establishing a local Child Tax Credit. Cities have consistently driven innovation in economic security policy from minimum wage increases to paid leave, guaranteed income pilots, and universal preschool. A Municipal Child Tax Credit represents the next evolution of city-led economic mobility strategy.
"For more than 25 years, LIFT has partnered directly with families to build brighter futures — through economic mobility coaching grounded in financial empowerment, living-wage employment, and educational achievement — all built on a foundation of hope, money, and love,” said Michelle Rhone-Collins, CEO at LIFT. “Breaking generational cycles of poverty requires systems-level change, and we're excited to support these Mayors with tools, resources, and insights informed by LIFT's approach as they work to create the conditions for more families to thrive."
The Mayors Advancing Economic Mobility grant recipients are:
Economic Mobility Coaching
Mayor John Horhn of Jackson, Mississippi
Mayor Frank Scott, Jr. of Little Rock, Arkansas
Mayor Monroe Nichols of Tulsa, Oklahoma
Mayor Connie Alsobrook of Conyers, Georgia
Mayor Christal E. Watson of Kansas City, Kansas (Wyandotte County, KS)
Child Tax Credit Planning
Mayor Fazlul Kabir of College Park, Maryland
“Ending childhood hunger requires more than helping families meet today's needs; it means building systems that expand opportunity for the future,” said Lillian Singh, senior vice president for Family Economic Mobility at Share Our Strength. “Mayors are uniquely positioned to connect families to systems of support where they already live, work, learn, and receive care. These grants recognize communities that are designing local solutions to strengthen economic mobility, because when parents have the opportunity to thrive, children do too.”
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About No Kid Hungry
No child should go hungry in America. But in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, 1 in 6 kids could face hunger this year. No Kid Hungry is working to end childhood hunger by helping launch and improve programs that give all kids the healthy food they need to thrive. This is a problem we know how to solve. No Kid Hungry is a campaign of Share Our Strength, an organization committed to ending hunger and poverty.
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About the Mayors Alliance
Launched in 2022, the Mayors Alliance to End Childhood Hunger harnesses the individual and collective leadership of mayors to end childhood hunger in communities nationwide. There is no excuse for children to go hungry in our country. Yet it happens – every day, in every community. The Mayors Alliance to End Childhood Hunger is a nonpartisan coalition working in partnership with Share Our Strength’s No Kid Hungry campaign to ensure that every child has the healthy food they need to thrive.