San Francisco

In mid-2007 the Family Independence Initiative (FII) enrolled 16 low-income families from the Bay View-Hunters Point and Visitacion Valley areas of San Francisco, CA. Eighteen months later the success of these first 36 adults and 50 children/teens inspired almost 200 even lower income families to ask to join FII so they could follow the success of the first families. The first families made tremendous gains in income, debt reduction, and children’s grades, among other things. When FII opened nominations to others, these first families began recruiting new families, pledging to pass on to others what they had learned and accomplished.

In San Francisco, 69% of the initial families enrolled were receiving some government subsidy, mostly housing supports. The household size averaged 5.4 members. All were living paycheck to paycheck and struggling to make ends meet. Some of the families did clerical work, cleaned homes, did yard work, construction, cooked and sold flowers.

By September 2008, after 15-plus months in FII the average household income of the first families increased 20.9%. Then the worst of the economic downturn hit but average income declined only one percent by December 2008. While the downturn impacted the families, they proved to be resourceful by taking on additional work, starting side businesses, and assisting one another. One of the most significant accomplishments is that by September 48% of the school aged kids had improved their grades, but when the December year end grades were reported 70% of the kids had improved their grades.

As has happened in the two previous pilots in Oakland and Hawaii, household income steadily improved the longer a family is enrolled in FII.

The two pilots in Oakland, CA and Oahu, HI were not set up to track or encourage the ripple effect of the enrolled families on the boarder community. San Francisco was set up to encourage this ripple effect. In September 2008, after about a year with FII, the first 16 families were encouraged to recruit new families into the project. Since FII expects families to take responsibility for themselves and their communities, the families that do the referral and the fellows are expected to play the primary role in orienting and supporting the new families. This approach also keeps FII’s staff size small.

Within six months the enrolled families recruited almost 200 new families by word of mouth. The referring families also seemed to be protective of FII’s principles, carefully explaining to their friends that if they come into FII they have to work on improving their lives or they will get very little from the experience.

The new families applying to FII appear to have slightly smaller household sizes and lower incomes than the first families. It is clear that enrolled families want to support and share their success with others who they think will benefit from FII’s particular approach. Like the first families, the new families are attracted to the choice and control FII offers. The first group of newly enrolled families has actually made progress more rapidly than the first 16 families though they are being impacted by the economic downturn.