Cash transfer pilot program kept young Arizonans from becoming homeless

A one-time cash transfer of $4,600 on average was enough to keep young people in Tucson from falling into homelessness. Those are the findings of a new report from Johns Hopkins University and the national homelessness organization, Point Source Youth.

The pilot program offered cash assistance to 345 young people between the ages of 16 and 26 in seven states, including Arizona, who were at risk of becoming homeless. Participants in the program also took part in housing planning training.

In Arizona, 27 young people facing housing instability participated. The program was administered locally by the Tucson organization Youth on Their Own.

A month after receiving the assistance, about 90% of the Tucson participants reported being in stable housing.

One participant had relied on a scholarship while attending the University of Arizona, but her new job didn’t start right away after graduation. A few thousand dollars covered the gap, said Bethany Neumann, director of development and communications with Youth on Their Own.

“For a lot of young people when they’re trying to move into an apartment or transition between one situation and another, if you don’t have that kind of savings, it’s really hard to do that. And those can be moments when youth find themselves destabilized,” Neumann said.

The report notes the cash transfers impacted more than just the 27 program participants — about half of the Tucson participants were either pregnant or were parents.

Neumann said the pilot showed it is much more cost-effective to prevent homelessness than it is to assist people who have already lost housing.

“Cash transfer programs like this address a problem before it becomes such a big problem, and have the potential to be a much less expensive way to address housing instability and homelessness.”

Neumann said the organizations involved plan to continue following up with participants to study the long-term impacts of the cash transfers.