TESTIMONY
Arturo Brito, President and Chief Executive Officer, Children's Health Fund on Preliminary Budget Concerns and Services Provision
4:04:12
·
138 sec
Arturo Brito discusses the Children's Health Fund's response to proposed budget cuts and outlines the organization's services in New York City.
- Brito describes how the Fund delivers medical, mental, dental, and social health services to children in homeless shelters and operates a clinic in the South Bronx.
- He highlights the Fund's national presence and emphasizes the importance of the flagship program in New York City.
- Brito expresses concerns over significant budget reductions proposed by Mayor Adams, including cuts to early child care and education funding.
- He introduces the 'Healthy and Ready to Learn' initiative, supported by NYC Council since 2014, as a key program in need of continued support.
Arturo Brito
4:04:12
Good afternoon.
4:04:13
Deputy Speaker, council members, thank you for your time.
4:04:17
I'm particularly sensitive to how Valeria time is.
4:04:20
I've worked in government before, so I'm very sensitive to that.
4:04:24
I'm going to give a brief overview first about our organization's Children's Health Fund, and then I'll talk about some concerns we have with the preliminary budget.
4:04:33
Then I'm gonna give an overview of healthy and ready to learn and turnover to our vice president, Purnell Bryce, of policy and advocacy to talk get more details in the 2 minutes, let it to him.
4:04:43
I'm Arturo Burrito, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Children's Health Fund, I'm also a community pediatrician with a population health focus.
4:04:54
Children's Health Fund has been in New York City since 1987.
4:04:59
And we continue to do provide services throughout the city to homeless shelters, bringing comprehensive health care services, medical, mental, dental, and meeting social drivers of health for children families, endosomal shelters.
4:05:13
We also our flagship programs also has a state of the art clinic in the South Bronx.
4:05:21
We are focused on children and families not only in New York City, but because of the model programs that we develop through mobile clinics, school based clinics, telehealth, and others.
4:05:32
We have a national network of 24 programs in 15 States, DC and Puerto Rico.
4:05:37
Again, our flagship program is here in New York City, and we're looking to expand to other sites throughout New York over the coming years.
4:05:46
So in terms of the preliminary budget for mayor Adams, we understand the challenging time this is.
4:05:51
Nonetheless, we're concerned about some of the proposed changes and reductions of the budget that are going to impact our children in the city.
4:05:59
$221,000,000 reduction from early child care and education, for instance, a $50,000,000 reduction in fiscal year 25 for out out years for early childhood efficiencies.
4:06:12
$9,500,000 reduction for child care claiming and ACS and others that you have details of.
4:06:19
So I'm going to turn over now to Mister Bryce to talk about our healthy and relevant program, which we have through your support.
4:06:25
Thank you very much since 2014, but have had in the city and Purnell.
