Oakland will give low-income families of color $ 500 a month, the mayor announces

Oakland will give low-income families of color $ 500 a month, the mayor announces

by

Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf announced this week that the city will launch a guaranteed income project to give hundreds of black and indigenous families and people of color $ 500 a month for 18 months.

Project payments will be unconditional and recipients can spend the money however they wish.

The Oakland Resilient Families program is the latest test of a “guaranteed income” wealth distribution system, where residents receive a certain amount of money each month to supplement the existing social safety net.
The goals of the project groups with the greatest wealth disparities in the city, according to the Oakland Equality Index, which reveals that the average income of white families in Oakland is almost three times higher than that of black families.
“The poverty that we all witness today is not a personal failure, it is a system failure,” Schaaf said in a statement. “Guaranteed income is one of the most promising tools for system change, racial equality and economic mobility that we have seen in recent decades.”

Guaranteed income offers security for those who need it most

Guaranteed income is different from Universal Basic Income (UBI), which would provide enough income to meet everyone’s basic needs.

Instead, guaranteed income serves only to supplement other salaries and programs for low-income residents, helping to build the “income floor” on which people in poverty can begin to build financially secure lives.
Although the idea has reappeared in recent years, it is not new – Martin Luther King Jr. defended it in his 1967 book, “Where do we go from here: chaos or community?”

“I am now convinced that the simplest approach will prove to be the most effective – the solution to poverty is to abolish it directly by a measure now widely discussed: guaranteed income,” wrote King.

Other cities have implemented it

In 2019, 100 residents in Stockton, California, began receiving unconditional payments of $ 500. Other initiatives in Newark, New Jersey and Atlanta, Georgia, were launched recently in 2020.
Former Stockton Mayor Michael Tubbs is the founder of Mayors for a Guaranteed Income, a network of mayors founded in 2020. Oakland Mayor Schaaf is also a founding member of the network.
“One of my hopes when testing a guaranteed income is that other cities will follow suit, and I am very happy that Oakland is among the first,” said Tubbs. “By focusing on BIPOC residents, the Oakland Resilient Families program will provide critical financial support to those hardest hit by systemic inequities, including the disproportionate number of the pandemic in communities of color.”

Oakland Resilient Families takes the guaranteed income model to new heights, with 600 families targeted for payments. The project, financed exclusively by philanthropic donations, has raised $ 6.75 million so far, of which at least 80% will be distributed.

Who is eligible?

To qualify for Oakland Resilient Families payments, families must have at least one child under the age of 18. Your income must be equal to or less than the area’s average income: about $ 59,000 for a family of three.

But half of the vacancies available will be reserved for very low-income families – those earning below 138% of the federal poverty level – or about $ 30,000 a year for a family of three.

An online multilingual screening form will be launched later this spring and summer, after which families will be chosen at random to receive payments. The program is also open to families without documents and / or without shelter. Since recipients will not be required to work for payments, money is not considered taxable income.

Oakland Resilient Families will partner with local community organizations and government leaders to incorporate community feedback during the implementation of the project, which is expected to be fully operational in the summer.

.Source