Economic reality

Political observers say that cutbacks affecting children, however painful, are a hard choice made necessary by the current economic climate.

When performing triage on bleeding city budgets, policing and security must be the priority, because rising crime can hurt every other aspect of city life, said E.J. McMahon, a fellow at the conservative Manhattan Institute.

If “you’ve got to balance out some summer park programs against policing the parks, I think you’ve got to choose policing the parks. It’s a tough choice but that may be what it comes down to in some places,” he said.

That seems to be the approach of Houston Mayor Annise Parker, who earlier this month proposed a budget that she argued maintained public safety as the city’s top priority — avoiding the layoffs of police officers and firefighters while closing eight swimming pools and seven community centers, and eliminating city-funded youth sports leagues.

But some children’s advocates argue that recreation can add to community safety and security just as much as policing.

In New Orleans, Mayor Mitchell Landrieu this year fulfilled a campaign promise to boost city funding for children’s recreation facilities and summer programs, despite the city’s economic difficulties. While last summer, about 700 children participated in sports and literacy activities through the city’s summer camps for children ages 5 to 18, this year the city is expecting to serve 5,000 campers with the help of local organizations, private partnerships and doubled city funds, said Gina Warner, the executive director of the city’s Partnership for Youth Development.

The city — where nine out of 10 recreation sites were damaged by Hurricane Katrina — will be opening 12 pools this year, up from seven the year before and three the year before that. And libraries will be coordinating with the city summer camps to keep children reading, Warner said.

Warner said that while her city faces the same economic struggles as its counterparts around the country, elected officials see the New Orleans summer programs as not only an investment in children, but also a crime-prevention tool.

“We’re a very tourism-dependent city, and so we can’t afford to have children who don’t have positive places to be during the summer,” she said.