Program Eligibility
The application for Guaranteed Income is now closed. The 400 residents for the pilot program have been selected. If you’d like to stay informed and receive updates on the program, we encourage you to join our mailing list.
Participants were randomly selected by our research partners from applications received. Residents at least 18 years of age whose income falls 200% below the federal poverty income threshold were eligible to receive guaranteed income through this pilot. For purposes of this study, guaranteed income was given to one recipient per household.
In Newark, this study also targeted people who may identify as housing insecure and people engaged with one of Newark’s community-based organizations or city departments for wraparound support. Housing insecure is used as an umbrella term that encompasses individuals who experience several dimensions of housing problems including affordability, safety, quality, insecurity, and loss of housing.
No, if you were not selected to participate in this program, you cannot receive the disbursement.
You can become an ambassador or advocate of the program. We provide training to our ambassadors to help them understand how to talk about the pilot program to others and we will include you in our community of individuals who will be the first to learn about our preliminary findings throughout the two-year period. To serve as an ambassador, email us at info@newarkequity.org.
We will work with our research team through Mayors for a Guaranteed Income to help distribute surveys every six months. The surveys will help us assess different areas related to income volatility, housing security, and overall health and well-being (just to name a few). The success of this program will be based on whether more individuals are able to report improved conditions related to housing security (for example, some examples of how success will be defined include an increase in the number of participants who are able to secure housing or an increase in the number of people who are able to afford housing without facing the looming threat of eviction).
If this program is successful, we would like to be able to appeal to policymakers at the state and federal level so that we can begin to have conversations about how to expand this.
Program Design
Selected recipients will receive $500 p/month; some persons will receive this on a bi-weekly basis and some recipients will receive this in two lump sums p/year.
This pilot will last for two years. After two years, the City of Newark would like to use data from this pilot to make encourage policymakers at the state and federal levels to adopt a similar policy.
Please visit our website to receive regular updates about our findings. You may follow us on instagram and/or twitter to stay tuned for updates.
We are actively working with the State to make sure that people who are receiving public benefits that include but are not limited to: SNAP, TANF, SSI/SSDI (among others) do not get removed from said programs.
Fundraising
The City of Newark is working closely with the Community Foundation of New Jersey (CFNJ). CFNJ will serve as the fiscal sponsor that will collect funds for this project.
If this program is successful, we anticipate that this will be funded through state and/or federal dollars.