The city will not renew its one-year contract for a pilot program that provided migrant families with prepaid debit cards, officials said Thursday.
“As we move towards more competitive contracting for asylum seeker programs, we have chosen not to renew the emergency contract for this pilot program once the one-year term concludes,” a spokesperson for City Hall said in a statement.
The debit card program will end in January.
When the program through financial technology company Mobility Capital Finance was announced in March, officials said it would help bring down the cost of feeding migrants and put money back into local businesses.
City Hall said the program helped more than 2,600 migrant families under the city’s care.
A family of four with two children under 5 years old were able to receive about $350 each week through the end of their stay, according to officials.
“We will continue to implement and learn from innovative pilot programs like the immediate response cards program as we care for hundreds of new arrivals every week,” the spokesperson said.