Austin approves pilot program to provide guaranteed income to low-income families

Austin City Council approved a taxpayer-funded pilot program to give selected families and individuals $1,000 a month for an entire year — with no strings attached. The city is partnering with the California-based nonprofit UpTogether to distribute over $1.18 million to 85 families and individuals struggling to make ends meet. The goal of the guaranteed-income program would be to help with utility payments, rent, child care or other out-of-reach necessities. The city's Equity Office and the Urban Institute, a D.C.-based think tank, will study the program’s effectiveness. After the yearlong pilot, the city could repeat the program. A vote on the measure was delayed late last month after legal and financial concerns were raised. Opponents argued the program's lack of specificity on what participants could spend money on was fiscally questionable — and that it wasn’t legal under state law.

So council went back to the drawing board. The Equity Office this week proposed some guardrails for the program, namely narrowing down who would qualify. Recipients would have show they're in danger of eviction, they've struggled to pay utility bills or they qualify for supportive housing reserved for people transitioning out of homelessness. Ahead of the vote, Austin Mayor Steve Adler pushed back on the assertion that the program was a "giveaway," arguing instead that Austinites should view it as "an investment." He also said the program would focus more squarely on preventing homelessness, citing Austin's skyrocketing housing costs and perennial issues surrounding affordability. He said the program would provide households with more flexibility than other social service programs with stricter rules around spending. Adler also pushed back on arguments that the lack of spending guidelines could lead to misspent taxpayer dollars. "I am discouraged by the rhetoric that this is a giveaway," he said. "I just think that's so misleading and so wrong and demonstrates a lack of understanding."