Cash with Care: Guaranteed Income for 60 Homeless Youth 

Covenant House has a plan to end youth homelessness as we know it, The Journey Home. It calls on all our sites in 34 cities to take bold, measurable steps to build a future where every young person is safely housed. 

So, when Covenant House New York was invited by the New York City Council to participate in a pilot program to provide direct cash transfers with no strings attached to young people facing homelessness — Cash with Care — we accepted the challenge. 

CHNY leaders asked all the right questions and then set up guardrails around the program to enhance the possibilities of its success.  

The pilot will test whether a guaranteed income can help young people transition out of homelessness. It was introduced in collaboration with policy research center Chapin Hall as part of a new strategic partnership called Insight to Impact (i2i) that is turning frontline practice into a continuous engine for prevention and scaling what works at a pace and scope neither organization can achieve on its own.  

Besides providing youth with monthly cash outlays, it also offers them services such as help with financial planning, housing searches, and career development. It will run through June. 

Read here to learn more about this bold new program and the difference it is already making for young people at Covenant House.  

Photo credit: Haidee Chu, The City