Brooklyn Launches Program To Help Residents Save Money
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- There is a new campaign to help Brooklyn residents save for a rainy day.
The goal isn't to save astronomical amounts of cash. Instead, the idea is to start off small.
"We're talking about a small amount that can be there to help you get over some form of emergency," Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams told CBS 2's Kevin Rincon on Wednesday.
Adams was in Restoration Plaza in Bedford-Stuyvesant to help launch the Brooklyn Saves Initiative. It's an effort to help close the racial wealth gap, and it starts by helping people save $400.
"The challenge was no one had ever really told me how to become financially literate. I would ask my dad things and he would just say figure it out," Hrutki Koyaki said.
Koyaki was $40,000 in debt, but he got the kind of help that'll now be offered to hundreds of families.
The first class started Wednesday. Valerie Crosland was one of the first to sign up.
"We didn't grow up in a technical age. We didn't grow up with all the resources that are available now like the internet and social media," Crosland said. "So it was a different take on how we were taught to interact with money. That wasn't our role."
Rincon asked Adams if the initiative would help fill a void in residents' lives, since so many of them were not properly educated on finances as children.
"Many of our young people, they learn their basic understanding of money from their parents, who have never received a basic understanding of money," Adams said.
Part of the initiative rolled out Wednesday includes a website. People who start a savings account through that site can get a dollar for dollar match up to $60. It's a way to get them on the right path.
Financial education classes are being hosted by the Bed-Stuy Restoration Corporation.