Press release

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Walter Fields
(646) 942-2788 (cell)
Tracy Munford
(212)614-5538 (office)
(646)483-6804 (cell)

City Leader to Weigh-In On Poverty Before Key Congressional Panel

David Jones Set to Testify Before Ways & Means Committee

-- New York, NY, January 22, 2007 --

• Sixteen percent of 16 through 24-year-olds, or 170,000 young people, are neither enrolled in school nor working, so-called “disconnected youth.”
• Over 40 percent of Black men in New York City are jobless.

While these specific figures apply to New York City, David Jones contends urban America is at-risk for greater poverty. 
 
As the new Congress begins to address poverty in America, the House Ways & Means Committee, led by Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY), has called on Jones, president and CEO of the Community Service Society of New York to deliver testimony.

Jones will discuss the economic consequences and dimensions of poverty and the challenges confronting the urban working poor.  For two decades David Jones has been the preeminent spokesperson on behalf of the poor in the nation’s largest city.  His presentation will include details of the impact of poverty on Black and Latino youth, Black male joblessness, and conditions affecting the working poor in New York City.

The Community Service Society of New York (CSS) has been the leading voice on behalf of low-income New Yorkers for 160 years and continues to advocate for the economic security of the working poor in the nation's largest city.

CSS tackles the complex issues of poverty through three mutually supportive approaches; as advocates for the poor, conducting research to help shape public policy and providing direct services that improve the quality of life for those trapped in poverty.

David Jones is available for interviews.

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