New Haven Independent

The feature was unveiled as part of a one-year anniversary celebration at City Hall Wednesday morning.

Exactly a year ago, as Mayor John DeStefano proudly pointed out, hundreds of people, many of them immigrants, started lining up outside City Hall’s doors to obtain new Haven’s ground-breaking ID card.

The card is available to all people who live here, including kids. It doubles as a library card and parking meter-feeder; obtains users access to city parks; and can help people open bank accounts. The card was designed largely, but not exclusively, in response to requests from the immigrant community. Undocumented workers in particular were having trouble opening accounts or otherwise participating in life int eh city, and were being targeted by muggers because of all the cash they carried around.

A year after its inception, 6,500 people have obtained cards, DeStefano announced outside the Elm City Residents office on City Hall’s first floor. A thousands of the cardholders are kids.

The program has gained the city national attention; drawn regular pickets and barbs from protesters (except, curiously, for the Wednesday morning event); sparked a state freedom of information battle; and become a template for cities around the country to emulate.

City Community Services Director Kica Matos (pictured at the top of the story with Mayor DeStefano at Thursday’s press event), who oversees the program, announced the names of three fondations that are funding the program’s $150,000 budget: JM Kaplan Fund (a product of the Welch’s grade juice fortune), Four Freedoms Fund, and Atlantic Philanthropy. Just as last year, not taxpayer money will be used, Matos announced.

The card’s upcoming new feature was described by Raul Hiojosa Ojeda (pictured), a UCLA prof who has developed a debit card tailored to helping people without bank accounts, especially African-Americans and Latino immigrants.

Ojeda, who flew into New Haven for the ceremony, said 48 percent of African-Americans in the country and close to 30 percent of Latinos don’t have bank accounts. They get socked by exorbitant fees by check-cashing services and when they try to pay bills.

His card — which he’s tailoring to New Haven’s ID card, with a hoped-for launch later this year — enables people to deposit and withdraw money at machines at pharmacies and laundromats as well as at ATMs. At much lower cost. Cash-dependent families save $60 to $100 a month. The pay bills directly through the card, often via cellphone.

Of especial importance to immigrants, holders can wire money back to family in another country for 75 percent less than they’d pay Western Union. And employers can deposit salaries directly into accounts.

The ID card will become a “virtual bank account” for many people once it’s implemented here, according to Ojeda, who directs at UCLA’s North American Integration & Development Center. He said 50,000 cards with some version of this program are being used nationwide.