Zaineb Salem was surprised to learn in April 2022 that she was no longer eligible for the cash assistance she’d been receiving from New York state. Salem, who has two young children, was not working at the time, because she was taking care of her disabled mother and undergoing mental health treatment after leaving a relationship. She’d been receiving roughly $700 a month in rental and cash assistance since her breakup the previous fall.

That winter, a couple of family members sent Salem small sums of money to cover expenses for her mother and children. “I wasn’t advised or told that one-time gifts count as income,” she said.

That became a problem when Salem went to the Monroe County Department of Human Services to renew her benefits for the first time. After reviewing her bank statements, a caseworker informed Salem that, with the money from her family, her income was too high for her to continue qualifying.

This month, more than a million New Yorkers with children are receiving checks in the mail from the state. The payments of up to $330 are a one-time supplement to the state’s child tax credit, passed as part of the state budget negotiated by the legislature and Governor Kathy Hochul this spring.

But one Albany-area Republican senator wants the state to go further and permanently give all new parents a $1,000 “baby bonus.”

“When I hear younger people in particular talk about starting a family, cost is a big factor in that and often cited as one of the reasons why they could be discouraged from pursuing a family,” state Senator Jake Ashby, who represents a district between Albany and the Vermont border, told New York Focus. “So I thought that this legislation could be helpful in addressing that.”

Ashby’s bill, introduced earlier this month, would supplement the state’s existing child tax credit, which gives low- and middle-income families up to $330 a year per child under 17. The $1,000 newborn payments would go to all parents. More than 200,000 babies are born in New York every year. Both the existing and proposed credits are fully refundable, meaning parents can receive them even if the credit amount is more than they owe in taxes.

Year after year, teachers in New York have had to fill in the gap left by their schools’ thin budgets for expenses as essential as classroom supplies.

During the 2019–2020 school year, New York teachers spent an average of $463 on school supplies, according to data from the National Center for Education Statistics. Ninety-five percent of them purchased supplies with their own money. Some turned to crowdfunding platforms like GoFundMe and Donors Choose to cover the cost of basic items like crayons, pencils, and snacks for their students.

New York Focus wants to know how teachers are preparing for the 2024–2025 school year. In partnership with Chalkbeat New York, we’re collecting stories from educators around the state.

Are you a teacher purchasing school supplies out-of-pocket? How much do you plan to spend? Fill out the form below, and let us know if we can connect with you.