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MANCHESTER, NH — While families furiously refresh their bank accounts, waiting for their stimulus payment from the IRS, the homeless population faces numerous setbacks in getting their share of the pie.
As part of the federal coronavirus relief package passed late last month, the CARES Act, Congress approved direct payments to U.S. citizens and permanent residents who have a valid Social Security number and who aren’t claimed as a dependent by another taxpayer.
Officially dubbed the Economic Impact Payment, the check starts at $1,200 for individuals and $2,400 for married couples and gradually lessens for higher-income households. Families with dependent children get an extra $500 per kid under 18.
Eligibility is extended to people who don’t normally file taxes, such as retirees, people who make less than $12,000 annually, and those who receive disability income from Social Security — three financial situations that are common among the homeless population.
Inside New Hampshire shelters, however, guests are trying to sort through the details: whether they’re eligible, how to find out, where their check would be mailed, if they should file taxes.
“To me this is one more example of how confusing everything is for everybody in the COVID response,” said Cathy Kuhn. For those experiencing homelessness, “really getting these checks to people as quickly as possible is critical.”
Kuhn wears multiple hats in homeless advocacy: She’s the executive director of the NH Coalition to End Homelessness as well as the chief strategy officer at Families in Transition-New Horizons, a Manchester organization that includes a 116-bed shelter for adults.
During the stay-at-home order, many of the places people experiencing homelessness might normally frequent for their basic needs are shut down. Advocates say a $1,200 injection could help someone ensure they have necessary supplies going forward, or it could give someone the boost they need to leave a shelter.
Spending the stimulus money is a planning project for down the road, however, and follows a pivotal first step: Receiving the money.
Because their living situation is relatively stable, Kuhn noted that families who are housed, even if it’s in temporary or transitional housing, have an easier time confirming they’re all set to receive the stimulus payment.
For people staying in emergency shelters or living outdoors, however, connecting them to those same resources is challenging. Although a mailing address might seem like the most obvious missing piece, homeless shelters often let people use their address, sometimes regardless of whether someone is an overnight guest.
“Identification is huge,” Kuhn said. “… That’s not a new thing necessarily; we have a lot of experience working with clients to be able to access those materials.”
But the stimulus payments require a Social Security number, she pointed out, and extended bouts of homelessness can make it tough to keep up with identifying documentation. New Horizons, like many homeless shelters and advocacy organizations, regularly helps guests track down birth certificates and obtain IDs.
She estimated that the majority of New Horizons clients — and likely those across the state — don’t have a bank account, and cashing a check requires a government-issued ID.
“Just the normal ways of doing business aren’t operating and so we’re just trying to work around that as best we can,” Kuhn said.
The NH Department of Motor Vehicles, for instance, has drastically reduced its services, according to an April 3 news release from the DMV, and closed all but five locations across the state: Concord, Dover, Manchester, Newport and Twin Mountain.
While ID card renewals are available online, the website doesn’t say anything about obtaining a new ID. The release directs questions about other services to the DMV’s customer service line, 603-227-4000.
Even if the five remaining locations accept ID applications, though, distance is another major factor. While some facilities are a quick drive from the nearest up-and-running branch, others are much farther: Keene’s two homeless shelters are more than 45 minutes from the Newport DMV.
Internet access can be a hurdle, too, particularly for unsheltered people. The IRS added several tools to its website to clarify the process, such as a link to check the status of one’s payment, an interactive method to determine if someone needs to file a tax return, and a form for non-filers to enter payment information.
While most shelters have a way for guests to get online, people staying outdoors are disconnected, especially since libraries and other facilities with public computers are closed.
Outreach workers across the state should think about “the ability to utilize tablets to go out to folks in the encampments,” Kuhn said, though she acknowledged that would take additional resources to accomplish.
Rob Waters is one such outreach specialist with Southwestern Community Services, which also operates shelters in Cheshire and Sullivan counties. For people living in camps in Keene and Claremont, he said he originally had some of the same concerns about their access to the stimulus benefits.
Waters conducted plenty of his own research to understand the disbursement details “because that was a lot of the cloudy parts that the clients didn’t understand,” he said, “… and that was because they had limited access to the information and they just knew they were getting money.”
But many of the issues he’d anticipated haven’t come up. Most of his unsheltered clients already used a P.O. box or a nearby homeless shelter as their mailing address, he said, and the bulk of them have bank accounts. As for Internet access, Waters said “when push came to shove,” people stood in parking lots near coffee shops to use their Wi-Fi and take care of any necessary business from their phone.
When the news of the stimulus package was first announced, Waters worried his clients would be under even more stress trying to figure out the details. Instead, he said most people just needed some clarification.
“The number one question I was getting probably 95 percent of the time was how much and when,” he said.
Pointing out the timing, Waters also said the proximity to when people typically receive tax refunds might have meant some were already lining up for money from the IRS.
In Portsmouth, Cross Roads House regularly hosts financial literacy classes to teach its guests about being “rent ready,” and Executive Director Martha Stone said that foundation has become even more important during this crisis.
“That’s one of the things that we work with our residents on in gen is supporting them to be able to manage their money responsibly once they’ve moved out, which is our ultimate goal,” she said.
Cross Roads House has sheltered around 110 people per night during the pandemic, including families, and Stone said anxiety levels among guests have been high.
“We have a lot of people who work, and they work in sectors that are considered essential, like grocery stores for example,” she said, noting safety concerns of employees. “… And we have other people who may have been laid off or furloughed.”
Like New Horizons, the Portsmouth organization depends on case managers to work with guests individually to determine whether they have an ID or a bank account when they arrive and help them obtain what they need.
Those same case managers are now keeping clients informed of COVID-19 and discussing how the stimulus money can be used as part of a long-term strategy.
“During a pandemic that adds additional challenges, but we do still have people moving out during this time period,” Stone said.
And while a $1,200 check certainly helps right now, she added that it’s still “extraordinarily difficult for the people we serve to obtain housing.” She pointed to a statewide average vacancy rate for rental units of 1 percent, which drives up competition and prices.
The stimulus money is a “piece of it, but it’s not going to solve all of the challenges that they may face,” Stone said.
Meanwhile, though, advocates said they’ll continue their efforts to inform, educate and extend resources to their clients, both sheltered and unsheltered.
“These are the folks that will fall through the cracks, right. These are the folks that are sort of invisible” to the rest of society, Kuhn said. “… So whatever we can do to make sure they don’t fall through the cracks is critical.”
⇒ More information available here at the IRS Economica Impact Payment info center.
Editor’s Note: Reporter Sierra Hubbard has worked at a local homeless shelter as a volunteer and paid shift-worker.
These articles are being shared by partners in The Granite State News Collaborative. For more information visit collaborativenh.org.
