Families, Parks and Recreation
Mayor's Children and Education Initiative
Parramore Kidz
Zone
History of PKZ
Parramore was Orlando’s toughest neighborhood when Buddy Dyer
became the city’s Mayor in 2003. Data painted a bleak picture of the
1.4 square mile neighborhood adjacent to Downtown Orlando. 73% of
Parramore’s children were in poverty and 47% of neighborhood adults
had neither a high school diploma nor GED. A disproportionate
percentage of city crime occurred in Parramore. Multiple structural
issues contributed to the area’s decline: the placement of seven
homeless shelters there, closure of the neighborhood’s only two
elementary schools, and the creation of a four-lane highway through
the residential sector[1].
Parramore’s luck began to change when Mayor Dyer was elected to
office. The Mayor committed to the revitalization of Parramore as
one of his earliest priorities. Parramore Kidz Zone (PKZ) was
launched in July 2006, after extensive community input via the
Mayor’s Education Action Council,
Mayor’s Parramore Task Force,
Blue Ribbon Panel on Education, and
Mayor’s Safe Orlando Task Force; visits to New York City to meet
with leaders of Harlem Children’s Zone including HCZ’s founder,
Geoffrey Canada; and receipt of $500,000 in grant funding from the
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and $500,000 in match funding from
Orlando-based charitable foundations. PKZ is part of the
Pathways for Parramore initiative under the Children & Education
Pathway.
The city subsequently allocated significant
resources to address the neighborhood’s housing, public safety,
quality of life and business development problems. This effort
culminated in the development of Parramore Kidz Zone (PKZ), a
neighborhood-based collaborative modeled after the well-known Harlem
Children’s Zone (HCZ). PKZ adapted the HCZ model by investing in,
enhancing and scaling up the neighborhood’s existing services and
institutions wherever possible. Rather than centering services
around a particular school, PKZ focused on providing primary
prevention services, such as tutoring and youth development
programs, to children at neighborhood-based sites. PKZ lowers
barriers for kids to join such programs through grassroots
marketing, subsidized fees, streamlined paperwork, and
transportation of children to programs. PKZ has expanded the
capacity of participating (mostly neighborhood-based) non-profits to
serve Parramore children by giving them funding, free space and
technical and administrative support.
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