A report lays out a five-year plan to provide 800 homes for youth exiting out of foster care in New York City.
The blueprint comes at a time when the city’s tight and costly housing market means many young adults aging out of foster care face homelessness.
The report was developed by The Center for Fair Futures and its Youth Advisory Board (YAB), The Children’s Village, HR&A Advisors, and Good River Partners. The findings were also guided by the work of the Fair Futures Housing Design Fellowship, led by six youth leaders who struggled to find housing after leaving foster care.
“Current and former foster youth, like I once was, struggle to find safe and stable housing in New York City,” said Anthony Turner, director of the YAB. “It’s time that stopped, and this report, led by young people impacted by the foster care system, shows us how to change the life trajectories of hundreds of young people aging out of foster care.”
The report notes that national research has found that 31% to 46% of transition-age foster youth have experienced homelessness at least once before they turned 26. In New York City, of the 429 youth who aged out of foster care in 2022, 31% had to stay in a foster or group home because they simply had no other housing options. Those who found housing were often living in poor conditions.
The new recommendations include:
- Seed a Fair Futures Housing Fund to accelerate the development of roughly 600 new homes;
- Scale and expand the use of master rental subsidy agreements to connect at least 200 young people aging out of foster care with quality apartments and so property owners and developers can rely upon these agreements;
- Increase the city’s drawdown of federal Foster Youth to Independence (FYI) vouchers;
- Automatically seek permanent vouchers for youth aging out of foster care. The city should, as a matter of policy, convert young people’s City Fighting Homelessness and Eviction Prevention Supplement and FYI vouchers into permanent Housing Choice Vouchers; and
- Create a centralized hub to offer continuous support and remove barriers to housing for young people aging out of care.
The report also notes that HR&A’s research suggests there is a critical role for mission-driven developers who want to leverage programs like the low-income housing tax credit to create projects that have units dedicated to the needs of young people aging out of care. It also notes there are opportunities to serve this population in mixed-income developments.
Read “Housing Justice for Young People Aging out of Foster Care in New York City” here.
Read AHF’s feature story on the latest developments and strategies for young adults.
