pre-K

A resolve to expand predecessor Bill de Blasio’s single greatest accomplishment, access to universal pre-K, transformed into fatal neglect of the program.

The trust’s largest beneficiary is the Riordan Foundation, a charity organization with a mission to help underserved communities receive better pre-K through 12th grade education and achieve collegiate success, said Jenelle Castleberry, executive assistant of the Richard J. Riordan Administrative Trust.

Four days before Joe Manchin killed that plan in December 2021, Data for Progress released polling showing greater than two-to-one support for a full suite of care-oriented policies: universal pre-K, paid family and medical leave, investments in child care to limit costs, long-term care for seniors and people with disabilities.

Maybe the economy and inflation were catchalls for deeper anxieties, barely articulated—health care costs; the price of pre-K through college education; the death, for so many, of the American dream of homeownership; the precarity of jobs in an age of gig work, side hustles, and artificial intelligence; all this in contrast to the growing concentration of wealth.

That would yield over $100 billion a year—money that could finance universal pre-K nationwide or build hundreds of thousands of desperately needed affordable housing units.