COMPLETED AND UPLOADED IN OCTOBER 2022 for DIG EN ESPAÑOL (NOW ENYE LB)
By: Richard Mendoza
The Long Beach Guaranteed Income Pilot Program was announced this past summer of 2021.
“This initiative will help 500 single parents in our city who live in poverty and struggle to meet basic needs,” explained Mayor Robert Garcia in the announcement of the pilot program.
Zip code 90813 was specifically chosen as it demonstrated the highest poverty rates of any zip code in Long Beach. The program has not yet begun but will provide a $500 a month stipend for about 12 months.
Full payments are not expected to begin until a full research study has been approved and authorized, according to Lucius Martin, acting business development officer for the city of Long Beach's economic development department.
According to Martin, the city of Long Beach is partnering with the Fund for Guaranteed Income (F4GI) to support the implementation of the income pilots, as well as to help seek additional private and philanthropic funding.
“F4GI was selected for this role through a competitive process due to the organization's demonstrated experience in implementing comparable guaranteed income programs, proven fundraising ability, comprehensive proposal and cost reasonableness,” explained Lucius.
“The Long Beach Latino Economic Report,” which began in 2018, is an effort to work through and highlight some of the issues prevalent in Long Beach's Latino communities, according to researchers.
As of 2020, 43.2% of Long Beach's total population is Latinx. However, Latinx communities continually rank among the lowest rates in education, income, digital access and health care, to name a few.
“There is still a large income gap, there is a higher concentration of poverty among select families than everyone else, there is a higher incidence of rent burden, meaning Latinos are predominantly renters in Long Beach, and there is a high proportion of them spending more than half of their income on rent,” explained Seiji Steimetz, an interim associate dean at California State University, Long Beach and one of the authors of the ”Long Beach Latino Economic Report.”
According to Steimetz, educational attainment is one of the biggest problems preventing Latino communities from having high social mobility. Many in the Long Beach Latino community cannot afford to leave their jobs to go back to school or work in a trade.
The idea around engagement programs like Long Beach's is not a new concept. The city of Stockton, California, implemented the Stockton Economic Empowerment Demonstration (SEED), the nation's first mayor-led guaranteed income demonstration.
The program was launched in February 2019 by former Mayor Michael D. Tubbs and provided 125 randomly selected residents with $500 per month for 24 months.
Key results of the program showed that the implementation of guaranteed income programs worked to reduce income volatility, the ability to find full-time employment, and alleviate financial scarcity, to name a few. Following the implementation of SEED, Tubbs and the Economic Security Project founded Mayors for a Guaranteed Income in June 2020.
Income program implementation in various parts of the country has shown great success in providing relief to those in need; however, there are still those who oppose these programs. Since the inception of said programs, advocates have worked to share narratives that paint the pilot programs in a good light, as well as inform those who are unaware of the work these programs do.
“Guaranteed income is fighting the narrative that if you give people money they will stop working,” said Kathrine Cagat, head of research and programs at Mayors for a Guaranteed Income. “There are some pilot programs that are challenging the narrative of who deserves rent, such as two programs that provide income to incarcerated citizens who were released.”
Comments