While the poverty rate in Maine was starting to gradually trend downward, COVID-19 has upended some of our progress and exacerbated hardships, particularly among communities of color. According to the Census’ Weekly Pulse data, in Maine, more than half of adults living in households with children lost employment income since March of 2020, while more than one in three of Maine adults living in households with children reported difficulty paying for usual household expenses in the past week.

Ann Danforth for Invest in Tomorrow

Invest in Tomorrow is an initiative undertaken by Maine organizations, businesses, and individuals (and coordinated by Maine Equal Justice) to cut Maine’s child poverty rate in half over the next ten years as a step toward eradicating child poverty in a generation. We know that solving child poverty will forever change the lives of Maine children and families for the better, while at the same time strengthening Maine’s workforce. Our priorities are informed by community input, as well as what the data is telling us, which we track through our Invest in Tomorrow dashboard. 

As we look at the data, we see that the child poverty rate in Maine has been relatively consistent over the last 10 years, with some spikes (2012) and some progress (2017). While the poverty rate in Maine was starting to gradually trend downward, COVID-19 has upended some of our progress and exacerbated hardships, particularly among communities of color. According to the Census’ Weekly Pulse Data, in Maine, more than half of adults living in households with children lost employment income since March of 2020, while more than one in three of Maine adults living in households with children reported difficulty paying for usual household expenses in the past week.

The impact of the pandemic on families and children has made Invest in Tomorrow’s shared goal of reducing child poverty while also strengthening Maine’s workforce more important than ever. Given the data, community needs, and progress we have made to date, the Steering Committee believes Invest in Tomorrow can make the most meaningful difference in 2021 working on the following priorities identified in the 2018 Invest in Tomorrow report:

• Streamline, simplify, and improve the delivery of supports and services for families living in poverty so they can access opportunity and sustain economic security, while at the same time, reducing inefficiencies in state government.
  • It should not be so hard to access public assistance programs and supports. Covid-19 has exposed the gaps and inadequacies in access to and the delivery of safety net programs. Our goal is to ensure that state systems and services are accessible, respectful, culturally competent, coordinated, responsive to people’s needs, and accountable to the people they serve.  Please see our 2021 Invest in Tomorrow priorities overview for details on opportunities to move this work forward in 2021.
• Ensure parents and caregivers have increased access to quality, affordable child care and early learning so they can sustain employment while providing their children with the support and learning that is necessary for healthy development.
  • A gap identified by the working group created by the 2019 Invest in Tomorrow bill package was the lack of child care available to parents who are immigrants, which creates an obstacle to employment. The Child Care Subsidy Program should be made available to working immigrant families. This recommendation was prioritized in the Economic Recovery Committee’s report to the Governor. Invest in Tomorrow sees this as an opportunity to support immigrant families' ability to work or participate in their communities, and make access to child care more equitable in our state.

Other areas identified as priorities in 2021 include: 

• Adequate food and nutrition, including strengthening the Pandemic EBT program, which has provided extra food to families with children to supplement free or reduced meals lost because of school closures.
• Stable and affordable housing, including exploring ways in which Invest in Tomorrow can support and advance efforts to address the looming housing crisis in Maine which has been exacerbated by the pandemic.

Invest in Tomorrow will continue to build on its work, ensuring strong implementation of the 2019 Invest in Tomorrow bill package (details here). We will also continue to support efforts to advance the other priorities identified by our community forums – the importance of which have been highlighted by COVID-19 – including:

• Health Care;
• Transportation;
• the Transition from Assistance to Employment; and
• Education and Training

Interested in learning more or getting involved? Take a look at the Invest in Tomorrow 2021 priorities 1-pager and reach out to Ann Danforth, Invest in Tomorrow Coordinator and Maine Equal Justice Policy Advocate, at adanforth@mejp.org