CHAPTER 6: CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
The Gateway Program provides case management, freeze on rents and benefits,
and access to other services participants need to achieve self-sufficiency
and to purchase a home. For those who graduated, the program had a moderate
impact.
Education: The majority of both program participants and a comparison
group attended education programs during the time of the program, with
participants attending more months of school than the comparison
group. However, a large majority of each group did not complete their education
programs. At the same time, program graduates completed education programs
at a higher rate than other program participants or the comparison group.
Employment and Income: The greatest increase in full-time employment
occurred among program graduates. Furthermore, program graduates had larger
incomes, hourly wages, and increases in average income at last observation
than other program participants or the comparison group.
Need-Based Benefits: Both those who graduated and those who withdrew
from the program decreased their dependence on AFDC, exceeding the rate
of decrease for the comparison group. Graduates also decreased their dependence
on Food Stamps. In addition, the greatest monetary reduction in both AFDC
payments and Food Stamp benefits was among graduates.
Housing Assistance: Graduates received housing assistance at
a lower rate than other program participants and the comparison group.
Furthermore, they experienced an average decline in their dependence on
public assistance, where the comparison group experienced an increase.
Graduates owned homes at a higher rate than other program participants
or the comparison group.
The program, however, had difficulty graduating participants, with only
32 percent of those who entered the program from 1989 until mid-1993 finishing.
The main reasons for the high drop-out rate were inadequate staffing, non-compliance
with program or public housing rules by participants, the difficulty of
juggling both student and parental responsibilities, and the necessity
to supplement AFDC payments by working.
The average program cost for the first 153 participants was $15,909
per participant, regardless of program outcome. Given that approximately
two-thirds of participants never completed the program, the cost per successful
participant was over $49,000.
Recommendations for the Gateway
Program
One of the main reasons for the high drop-out rate in the Gateway Program
was inadequate staffing. The typical program participant will encounter
many obstacles on the road to self-sufficiency, and the staff must be available
to provide advice and support so that those obstacles can be overcome.
In focus groups, graduates of the program frequently mentioned the importance
of counseling provided by the staff. Regular contact with participants
helps the staff identify and solve problems that may cause participants
to drop-out of the program, but a small staff and rapid turnover can prevent
effective intervention. Instead of one staff person for every 100 participants,
as was the case in the beginning of the program, the maximum number of
participants that can be properly counseled by one staff member is no more
than 40 participants.
Recognizing the problem, in late 1993, the CHA applied for and received
additional funds from the City of Charlotte to increase staffing for both
Gateway and its other self-sufficiency programs. The CHA used these funds
to hire additional case workers, thus reducing the case load to approximately
40 participants per worker and improving case management.
Based on the results of our focus groups, the CHA should again attempt
to cluster participants in one of its more attractive housing developments.
Focus group participants told of the lack of support they received from
their friends and neighbors for their improvement efforts. Their community
environments were simply not conducive to completing the program. They
wanted to be in communities that provided them with emotional and practical
support for achieving self-sufficiency. Currently, the CHA is renovating
Earl Village with the help of a HOPE 6 grant, and it may be possible to
cluster transitional families there, when the renovation is completed.
Gateway should offer a more flexible approach to education programs
in order to serve a larger number of public housing residents. In conjunction
with altering the educational options, there should be a change in the
focus of the program to include housing options other than homeownership.
The opportunity for homeownership was the most compelling reason for people
to participate in the program. However, the program had great difficulty
attracting qualified public housing residents for whom homeownership within
seven years could be a realistic possibility. To earn enough income to
purchase a home, participants had to go back to school full-time for two
years; this was more than many public housing residents were ready to take
on. A change in the education requirements could attract participants who
wanted a less intensive educational program and who could move out of public
housing, but for whom a private rental situation is a more realistic option.
Offering flexible educational opportunities that are less intensive
may help persons move to private sector rental housing or homeownership.
The program should create a special track for those people that need to
earn their high school degrees before entering the program. All of these
options would allow the program to serve a broader segment of the public
housing population.
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Recommendations for Self-Sufficiency
Programs and Welfare Reform
The experience of the Gateway Program can apply to other self-sufficiency
programs and to current welfare reform efforts. Both welfare reform and
self-sufficiency programs focus on reducing the number of people dependent
on public subsidies. Often, the populations receiving housing assistance
and welfare are the same. Wiseman (1996) notes that, "In 1995, public
assistance was the primary source of income for 47 percent of the families
with children that received housing assistance." Therefore, the lessons
we learn from this housing self-sufficiency program have relevance for
welfare reform.
First, a two-year remediation phase appears to be an unrealistically
short time for many public housing residents to gain the skills necessary
to become totally self-sufficient. As one Gateway program staff member
commented, "Two years is too short a time to get from $0 an hour to
$9 an hour." Gateway participants were the most educated and motivated
of public housing residents, yet they had a 62 percent withdrawal rate.
For those who are less educated and less motivated than the people who
entered the Gateway Program, becoming self-sufficient could take much longer.
These results suggest that it will take most public housing residents more
than two years to complete the education necessary to substantially increase
their incomes. Likewise, it will likely take those on welfare more than
two years to gain the skills to find jobs that pay enough to be totally
self-supporting.
Second, leaving need-based benefits is the most difficult part of achieving
self-sufficiency. That 27 percent of Gateway graduates still received Food
Stamps and 10 percent still received AFDC after they had left the program
illustrates the obstacle. Although they had left public housing, a portion
still had incomes low enough to receive welfare payments and food stamps.
Third, without funding for adequate staffing, the drop-out rates will
be high. A major reason for the high drop-out rate among Gateway participants
was the lack of adequate staffing to counsel them through the program.
Those who are trying to leave welfare and public housing need help negotiating
the many obstacles to self-sufficiency. Currently, however, funding for
staffing self-sufficiency programs is limited.
Fourth, the costs of moving people off public subsidies are likely to
be expensive, at least in the short run. The Gateway Program cost more
than $15,000 per participant, regardless of program outcome. Only 32 percent
of those participants graduated. Furthermore, the increases in wages and
employment were moderate, compared to the comparison group. The Gateway
Program offered stable benefits as long as the participant’s income remained
at less than 50 percent of the area median. The question for welfare reform
is if threatening to end and actually terminating those same benefits will
be any more successful in moving people, not simply off public subsidies
but also out of poverty.
If self-sufficiency programs and welfare reform are serious about aiding
people to increase their incomes, they must take into consideration the
constraints on those that the programs try to serve. One of those constraints
is the single-parent status of many benefit recipients. In the Gateway
Housing Program, 95 percent of both program entrants and comparison group
members were unmarried and over 90 percent were parents. For many, family
responsibilities simply interfered with attending school. Being a single
parent meant that many were unable to complete their programs within the
two-year time limit. Missed classes due to family responsibilities created
undue additional pressure for many program participants. Reliable child
care is therefore a key ingredient in a successful attempt at either a
self-sufficiency program or welfare reform.
The expectation underlying both self-sufficiency programs and welfare
reform is that a single parent can work and raise her children independently
of public subsidies. While this is not impossible, at low levels of education
the task becomes nearly nightmarish. In addition to providing adequate
child care to bolster parents’ attempts at self-sufficiency, we may need
to help these predominantly female heads of households create support networks
or households with others like themselves. Gateway participants not only
commented that being clustered would enable them to stay motivated, but
they also talked about being able to share child care responsibilities.
A group setting with similar circles of people interested in self-sufficiency
would allow cross-dependence, sharing of information, cooperation in family
responsibilities, and support for each other’s efforts. Going it alone
may not be the answer to the problem of dependence on public assistance.
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