FY23 Annual Report
Thanks to Our Partners
Dear Partners,
Thank you for preventing homelessness.
Your impact on New Yorkers is best articulated by Guadalupe, whose family participated in our programs this year, and who wrote the following message to our supporters:
“It means the world to me that you saved my place where I live and made sure my children are safe in our home. Thank you so much for caring and giving with your donations. You are angels in this world.”
With your support this past year, The Partnership’s Save Homes Campaign provided more than 5,000 direct services and saved homes for 3,000 New Yorkers.
Thanks to you and supporters like the Federal Home Loan Bank of New York and Trinity Church Wall Street, we were able to combine housing and crisis interventions with mental health and well-being services to reach families on the brink of homelessness and change their stories. We initially stepped in with rent arrears payments, landlord mediations and benefits assistance to prevent imminent evictions, and, once the immediate housing crisis was addressed, our individual therapy and group work provided our families an opportunity to address the complex trauma many endure, stabilizing them in their homes long-term.
By supporting families to keep their homes, you also lessened the number of people showing up to shelters, in a year of record high shelter numbers, saving millions in public dollars.
And, because your investment in prevention made it possible for tenants to pay off their rent arrears, you also increased smaller landlords’ ability to meet mortgage payments and keep apartments in the housing market, further driving overall community well-being in many of the city’s lowest income neighborhoods.
As a new year dawns, more than 350,000 children are in NYC homes in arrears. With your support, we will continue working upstream to prevent as many children as possible from losing their homes.
Thank you for understanding that the most cost-effective and humanitarian way to end homelessness is to step in before it happens and prevent families from losing their homes.
Áine Duggan, President & CEO
Building Blocks
FY23 Impact
Impact Highlights
- The provision of 5,000 direct services
- Homes saved for 3,000 New Yorkers
- A per household cost of $3,300, saving $116M in public spending on shelter.
Direct Services included:
- Rental arrears grants made directly to landlords
- NYC One Shot Deal navigation and advocacy for all eligible families
- Landlord negotiations and mediation to secure rent and arrears discounts, new leases and repairs
- Crisis intervention and casework to secure access to government benefits, legal services, emergency food programs, drop-in centers and shelter
- Mental health screenings and individual counseling (in-person and via telehealth)
- On-site pantry for basic household supplies
- Small direct cash grants to address emergencies
- A broad curriculum of trainings and group work focused on well-being, mutual aid support groups, tenants’ rights and responsibility, financial empowerment and employment and career development
Who Received Services
Most NYC homelessness is invisible to most New Yorkers. Women and children of color who account for more than two-thirds of people in shelter or in rental arrears and on the brink of losing their homes are the face of NYC homelessness. Most are struggling to keep a roof over their head and survive on low income. Many more women hurt by homelessness are navigating the complex trauma that results from histories of child abuse and domestic violence.
Our clients mirror this citywide trend:
- Women account for 80% of all households served and 69% of those aged 65+
- Women and children account for more than two-thirds of clients served
- More than half of clients (57%) are working
- People of color account for 95% of all clients
- Approximately 70% of clients are below 30% Area Median Income (AMI); 98% are below 50% AMI
- More than one in ten clients (11%) are 65+; the average age of adult clients is 48
Kai and Jay’s Story
When Kai and Jay came to The Partnership in the early summer of 2023, they were afraid. Drowning in almost a year of unpaid back rent, their landlord had recently taken them to Housing Court and they were facing the reality of losing their home and ending up in the shelter system with their four children.
As they spoke with a program manager during the intake process, the full picture of their dilemma took shape. Although they were both working and up-to-date on current rent, their modest wages made it impossible for them to catch up on the year of back rent that had accumulated after Kai became unemployed during the COVID pandemic.
Jay, a public-school teacher, was also in the final year of a master’s degree program and Kai had recently returned to an in-office administrative assistant role. Their loss of income during the pandemic combined with two years of rent increases made getting caught up on back rent payments impossible. Although they were trying to pay a little extra rent every month to clear their arrears, progress was slow and occasionally disrupted when unexpected expenses, like medical costs or new jackets for the children, meant that often they could barely stretch their combined monthly income to cover the current month’s rent.
Like many other NYC families navigating the stress of being sued in Housing Court this year, Jay and Kai’s family was left behind by the underfunding of the federal Emergency Rental Assistance Program (ERAP). When ERAP funding ran out, more than 400,000 homes across the city were in arrears.
As part of the intake process, we assessed that the family was eligible for the City’s One-Shot Deal program (which provides partial rental assistance for arrears) and we immediately provided the couple with navigation support to access this benefit. Simultaneously, we leveraged our private funding to cover the family’s remaining $5,000 arrears balance and worked in tandem with one of our partner organizations who provide free legal services to ensure the family was represented in court.
Once the arrears were paid, Jay, Kai and their four children were able to remain in their home. Jay has since graduated and with both Jay and Kai working full-time, they have remained up to date on their rent payments.
As Kai and Jay emphasized gratitude that throughout the crisis their four children remained safe in their own home and school and their lives were not derailed by an abrupt fall into homelessness, Jay shared:
“It meant a lot for my family because we won’t be in the streets. The service was all very helpful and attentive, if something is amiss they catch it.”
— Kai
Names of clients have been changed to protect their confidentiality
Increasing the Footprint
Increasing Need
At The Partnership, client need increased in FY23, with more than half of all new clients presenting in the last quarter of the year. Similarly, City and national data show that throughout 2023 the risk and experience of homelessness in NYC worsened and the need for prevention services has increased.
- More than 4,000 New Yorkers are living on our streets; a record 90,000 New Yorkers are in the City’s municipal shelter system (as of December 1, 2023)
- Thirty-three thousand children account for almost two in five (37%) of all New Yorkers living in homeless shelters
- More than 1.1 million New Yorkers in 440,000 households, including 350,000 children, are in rental arrears and on the brink of homelessness
- The estimated cost of clearing the rental bills for the 440K households in arrears is approximately $1.47B, whereas the estimated cost of shelter for the same number of households would be more than $44B (The average rental arrears per household is $3,300 whereas the average cost per household of providing shelter is $100,000)
Compounding factors are driving the increasing need:
- The end of COVID-era protections (notably the eviction moratoria and federal Emergency Rental Assistance Program (ERAP)), without ERAP being fully funded and assistance being available to all who needed it, left many low-income New Yorkers still struggling to clear back rent as the city rebounded
- Surging rents in an already tight rental market (NYC rent prices have increased 3% and 3.5% over the last 2 years respectively)
- Wages not keeping pace with increased cost of living and reduced wages for people in low-income communities (as many retail and hospitality businesses have reduced hours and opted for earlier closing times, many service workers find themselves with reduced wages and unable to keep pace with increasing costs of living and rent)
- Fewer legal resources are available to people in housing court (only one-third have access to legal representation)
Partners in Prevention
Many FY23 individual and institutional partners have increased their Save Homes Campaign gift to better address the intensifying crisis and need. Leading the way are the Federal Home Loan Bank of New York who doubled their annual gift to become a Save Homes Campaign Foundational Partner and Trinity Church Wall Street who has stepped up as a Save Homes Campaign Champion.
Save Homes Campaign Foundational Partner
At the Federal Home Loan Bank of New York, we know that a stable and affordable home is the foundation from which individuals, families and communities grow and flourish. But we also know that, for many New Yorkers, the risk of losing that stable foundation has worsened in recent years. The Partnership To End Homelessness’ Save Homes Campaign is an extraordinary, innovative, and effective approach to ending homelessness before it begins. We are thrilled to be able to support The Partnership in this vital effort to help keep New Yorkers in their homes and that stable foundation in place.”
— José R. González, President and CEO of FHLBNY
In addition to assisting families to keep their homes, our supporters of homelessness prevention are lessening the number of people who require shelter — saving millions in public dollars — and subsequently increasing smaller landlords’ ability to meet mortgage payments and keep apartments in the housing market, further driving overall community well-being.
Save Homes Campaign Champion
Social Justice is one of Trinity Church Wall Street’s core values and is foundational to our mission to build neighborhoods, generations of faithful leadership and financial capacity for mission-driven organizations. New York City is experiencing a crisis of mass homelessness and housing instability that impacts the most vulnerable people in our city.
Trinity Church Wall Street Philanthropies’ Housing and Homelessness Initiative seeks to address housing instability and end mass homelessness in New York City by supporting organizations like The Partnership To End Homelessness that prioritize helping New Yorkers in need of various services that support their ability to remain stably housed.
Trinity Church Wall Street is proud to support The Partnership’s Save Homes Campaign for a second year to continue upstream homelessness prevention services and increase the organization’s capacity to provide mental health and wellness support.”
— Trinity Church Wall Street
The Blueprint
About The Partnership
The Partnership To End Homelessness’ values — compassion, inclusion, integrity, professionalism and social justice — steer our strategy, decision-making and operations as we work to achieve our mission of ending homelessness by preventing it.
During recent years, The Partnership leveraged its 40-year history serving New Yorkers at risk of, experiencing or recovering from homelessness to hone our approach to one of upstream interventions. We are one of the only NYC homeless services organizations whose complete purpose is to step in before people lose their homes and prevent New Yorkers from living in shelters or on the streets.
Prevention is the most humanitarian solution to ending homelessness and breaking the cycle of intergenerational homelessness. Going into a shelter causes significant disruptions to work and school schedules, and less than half of all children who go into a shelter graduate high school, putting them on a fast track to the kind of poverty that puts them at risk of homelessness as adults with their own children.
Currently more than 1 million New Yorkers in 440,000 households — including 350,000 children — have average rental arrears of $3,300. More than two-thirds of people at risk are women and children of color, most of whom are surviving violence and abuse. The total cost of saving their homes is $1.47B in contrast to the more than $40B the City and State would spend if the families in arrears lose their homes and end up in the homeless shelter system.
Our Save Homes Campaign is a client-informed upstream intervention model that combines financial and housing assistance with mental health and well-being services to prevent evictions and keep New Yorkers in their homes (and out of shelters) long-term. Our housing program — which provides rental and financial assistance — addresses immediate crises and ensures our clients keep their homes. Thereafter, our mental health and well-being services address the complex trauma our clients endure, providing culturally-appropriate mental health care to stabilize clients in their homes long-term.
The Save Homes Program Model
Most of our clients are women and children of color, immigrants and members of the LGBTQIA+ community, who come to us via recommendation or word of mouth. In addition to struggling to make ends meet on low incomes, a majority are living with complex trauma that stems from experiencing domestic violence, childhood abuse and/or sexual violence. Without the grounding of a safe home and the opportunity to access therapy, they are at increased and repeated risk of homelessness. Homelessness, in turn, puts women and children at increased risk of intergenerational homelessness and violence. Because going into a shelter can cause significant disruptions to work and school, less than half of all children who go into shelter graduate high school, putting them on a fast track to the poverty that can cause homelessness.
From the moment of meeting our clients, we first focus on clearing their immediate crisis: the threat of losing their home. Once the threat of an eviction is eliminated and a family feels safe in their home, they are able to engage with our supportive services, including mental health counseling. This program pacing allows our clients to focus on longer term goals like therapy related to domestic violence, health and well-being programming, job training and career development, school and other training.
Housing and Crisis Assistance: Clear the Immediate Crisis
New Yorkers on the verge of homelessness experience high levels of stress and often cannot fully focus on other goals until the crisis is resolved. Our rental assistance model disrupts standard practices and brings assistance to those who most need it as efficiently as possible. Our model is a full grant payment (no loans) that is accessible to immigrants and citizens, regardless of employment status.
- We pay the full amount of arrears, in contrast to standard rental assistance programs that traditionally cap payments to one month’s rent or a portion of their arrears, forcing clients to invest hours of their time cobbling together grants from multiple sources
- Rather than making income and future ability to pay prerequisites for receipt of housing assistance, we provide rental assistance as a first step to keep families safely housed while we provide them with ongoing support to secure and/or improve their income
- We assist migrants and immigrants who are ineligible for government assistance
- If a client is being sued by their landlord for nonpayment of rent, we initiate mediation and work collegially with the landlord to resolve the arrears, securing discounts where possible. When necessary, we collaborate with our legal services partners to ensure the client has legal representation
- In situations where clients who have experienced domestic violence feel unsafe or there are other extenuating circumstances to prevent a client from remaining in their current home, we work with the families to find new, safe homes
- Experienced and trained staff provide hands-on crisis intervention services and referrals, to give clients access to food pantries, government benefits, child care, education access and financial aid
- In circumstances of unmet costs beyond rent and utility assistance, such as the need for survivors of gender-based violence to change a door lock or a family struggling to provide basic necessities to their children, we provide small cash grants and/or provide assistance via our on-site pantry
Health and Well-being: Address the Emotional Well-being Needs
The threat of homelessness, compounded by the overwhelming nature of housing court results in stress for the client and family, which can exacerbate an already stressful situation: our clients (most of whom are women and children of color) experience poverty, domestic violence, childhood sexual trauma and health issues at higher rates than average.
- We maintain a trauma-informed environment and offer mental health and well-being programming when clients are ready to engage
- Our social workers provide culturally-competent one-on-one counseling in a safe environment
- We offer mutual aid support groups for people who have experienced domestic violence, child sexual abuse and other trauma
- We offer financial empowerment programming that covers budgeting, banking and credit and other workshops including tenant’s rights and responsibilities and how to secure employment
We work with our clients for at least one year. Because we offer trauma-informed care, we know that the client's trajectory toward stability is circuitous. We will be available whenever a client needs us — including ready to provide another financial grant if needed.
Thank you to our FY23 Partners
Client Feedback
Throughout the year, many stakeholders have confided that as homelessness increases throughout the city, the problem can feel so big as to be daunting. In this report, we have shared the impact of your collective action to the lives of thousands of New Yorkers. The difference you make as a community that supports prevention is best summarized by New Yorkers who asked to thank you for the safety of their homes:
Kadisha:
“Just to say, thank you so much — without you all I was going to be homeless with my children. Thank you very much!”
Linda:
“Muchas gracias por su ayuda estaban conmigo en el momento que los necesite me ayudaron en ese tiempo que fue tan duro para mi familia muchas gracias.”
Jess:
“I am extremely grateful for such a great organization. Because of this I was able to not get evicted and my child was able to continue her college education.”
Marvie:
“My family and I were going through a bad time, my grandmother suffered a stroke and my mother lost her job while taking care of my grandmother and we fell behind in paying the rent. I always saw my mother worried about not being able to pay each month. But thanks to you, now my mother is calm and we are moving forward.”
JP:
“I don’t have anyone to call for aid these days, I have no parents or siblings. Your assistance has been heaven sent. Thank you.”
Jenni:
“Your service means the world to me. I want to thank you for all the help y'all provided for my daughter (5yr old) & I’m forever thankful.”
Shama:
“I thought we would be homeless, but thankfully The Partnership is saving me from being evicted. My management office has been very difficult and The Partnership continues to support me and try their best to resolve everything. I am very grateful for the program and assistance I have received. I’m also thankful for the additional courses and services that you provide. Thank you.”
Yasmin:
“Y’all service means a lot to me & my family. The Partnership program has kept a roof over our heads.”
Names of clients have been changed to protect their confidentiality
