By Dustin Tyler Joyce
April 27, 2009

Omaha Mayor Mike Fahey accepted a Dollar Wi$e Capacity Grant for $15,000 from The United States Conference of Mayors in a ceremony at city hall on April 6. In addition to funding an expansion of the city’s workplace financial education effort, the grant will help the city and its community partners launch "Bank on the Midlands," a program modeled after the successful and widely admired Bank on San Francisco. Fahey was joined by United Way of the Midlands staff member Julie Kalkowski, managing director of the Financial Stability Partnership (FSP), a joint project with Omaha, which will administer the grant.

“The Dollar Wi$e Capacity Grant will enable the Financial Stability Partnership to expand its current workplace financial education and launch an innovative pilot program targeting low-income workers,” Fahey announced. “The FSP will identify two businesses in the Omaha community with at least 20 employees who earn a salary less than 200 percent of the federal poverty line. These employees will have the opportunity to enroll in nine hours of financial education classes provided by the FSP, receive up to six household financial consulting sessions, and learn how to develop savings, repair their credit and open bank accounts.”

Fahey also noted the collaborative nature of the employer-based financial education program. “Workplace financial education leverages the resources of the employer, financial institutions, and the community to help Omaha families reach financial stability and improve their quality of life,” he said.

Kalkowski added that, while Omaha is a vibrant community, many of its residents face the same financial challenges found throughout the country, including low financial literacy, lack of a relationship with a mainstream financial institution, and reliance upon check cashers. Among the statistics Kalkowski highlighted: of the 48,000 households in Douglas County that earn less than $25,000 a year, 80 percent are unbanked.

Serving this unbanked community, Omaha has 107 check cashers, or one for every 2,300 residents, which is considerably higher than the national average of one for every 3,500 residents.

If the FSP is successful in helping just a quarter of these unbanked households open and maintain bank accounts through "Bank on the Midlands," residents would save an estimated $2.6 million annually in check-cashing fees—money that could go back into Omaha’s economy.

The workplace financial education and "Bank on the Midlands" will together serve to complement the city’s wide range of existing financial literacy programs, including EITC outreach, VITA sites, fore closure prevention, and the Microbusiness Development Program, which offers education and microloans to help low-and moderate-income Omahans open their own businesses.

“I’d like to thank the Financial Stability Partnership for their commitment to this program, and I am confident this pilot program will provide valuable opportunities for its participants,” Fahey concluded. “If this pilot program is successful, the Financial Stability Partnership will expand its services to other employers to reach even more individuals in our community.”