Seattle Turns Soda Tax Revenue into Emergency Grocery Vouchers During Pandemic

An effective way to help those most vulnerable to climate disasters is by providing just-in-time cash transfers right before a disaster hits for them to use as they see fit for resilience and climate change adaptation.

The Mar a Mar association is slowly improving the 174-mile hiking trail, Camino de Costa Rica, with new infrastructure to attract more tourists. The path was built to bring tourism profits inland to the local communities that need it. The association is also helping members of those communities develop small businesses around the trail.

The Toolkit program run by the Business Development Fund in Rwanda is helping young entrepreneurs fund their startups. Once a candidate applies for and receives funding by pitching their business idea, they receive a grant for half the cost and a loan for the other half. Loan repayment begins with no interest after a three-month grace period.

The economic impact payments and expanded child tax credits given to American households during the COVID-19 Pandemic helped reduce rates of child poverty and food insecurity.

Thousands of undocumented immigrants who lost their jobs during the pandemic can now receive aid through New York's Excluded Workers Fund. The $2.1 billion fund is the largest of its kind and the result of 18 months of lobbying, protests, and campaigning by community groups. Approved applicants can qualify for $15,600 or $3,200, depending on their ability to prove New York residence, previous employment, and lost income. Applications and fund information is made available in 13 languages and partnerships with grassroots organizations has been critical to reaching people who are eligible to apply.

Several states are offering incentives to encourage people to get vaccinated against COVID-19. Ohio’s Vax-a-Million program was one of the first state-based cash lotteries, awarding five residents over 18 a $1-million prize and five full college scholarships to residents ages 12-17. Vaccination rates jumped 28% in the first week of the program. Other states have looked to boost vaccination rates by offering creative incentives in addition to cash lotteries, including prepaid grocery and subway cards, tickets to local attractions, hunting rifles, free beer, and even cannabis joints in Washington state.

Togo distributed money to people in need, including informal sector workers, by identifying them using machine learning. Algorithms search satellite photos for clues of poverty, using measures like building density, and individuals within those areas are found using mobile phone data as a proxy of their wealth. Media campaigns also encourage people to apply for assistance. Once eligibility is confirmed, the first of five monthly payments is instantly sent to their phone and can be collected at local pick-up points. People without mobile phones can use an inexpensive SIM card in a borrowed phone.

An American nonprofit called the Community Reinvestment Fund expands access to small business loans by partnering with almost two dozen groups across the country to set up and scale up their community development lending. Founded in 1988, the group essentially takes on the risk of a SBA license so that others could benefit from their license. They created an online platform called Spark that redesigned the user interface of the existing loan processor platform to better facilitate the exchange of money. They have now supported loans for 1,000 communities across 49 states.

The Bank of North Dakota is the only state-owned bank in the country, and their lending program is so effective that the federal government followed suit in the face of the unprecedented coronavirus. North Dakota's program is named The Main Street Lending Program, and it works by allowing local banks to be able to offer more loans to small businesses in their time of need by supplying 95% of the loan. This article explains how it works and lays out, policy by policy, the similarities and differences between North Dakota's approach and the federal government's subsequent approach.

The stimulus checks sent out by the U.S. government in an attempt to alleviate the economic stress caused by the quarantine do not account for those who are undocumented, mixed-status families, and people who don't qualify for unemployment. What started as an idea between a few people grew into a state-wide fund called the Mass Redistribution Fund in which people donate their stimulus checks to those who cannot get one themselves. By April 15th the group had raised $25,000 from 54 donors and even secured a match pledge from the Hyams Foundation. Others are creating similar programs across the country.