While Arizona continues to struggle with an affordability crisis, one successful housing program that’s helped over 1,000 Valley families has been given the green light to expand its efforts.
Arizona’s Threshold plan has already found homes for 1,250 households, thanks to a $5 million investment from the Biden administration’s American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA). Since launching the program in May 2022, the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors has approved an additional $2.5 million to grow the program and keep it running through June 2025.
Easing the housing crisis
In May 2022, advocates for both those experiencing homelessness and landlords in Maricopa County joined forces to unclog the bottleneck of people searching for dwellings in the increasingly expensive housing market.
In a plan that helped the unhoused and landlords alike, they devised “Threshold,” an unprecedented collaboration of several sectors:
Public: The Maricopa County Human Services Department
Private: HOM Inc.
Property Owners: Arizona Multihousing Association
Hundreds of landlords were offered financial incentives to rent to displaced people, including families with children, the working poor, and others with housing challenges.
All they needed was the money to pay for it.
Funding boost from Biden Administration
That’s where ARPA came in – with $5 million. With funding from ARPA, Threshold has been able to provide:
- Rental homes for 1,250 households
- Homes throughout Maricopa County in 16 cities
- Rentals for under $1500 a month
- $1 million to augment rents
Help for the unhoused and landlords
The ARPA funding helps landlords as well as unhoused people. Threshold’s cash incentives meet landlords’ economic needs, and ARPA-funded rent subsidies help the unhoused find and rent safe, comfortable housing they otherwise might not be able to afford.
There has been a dramatic increase in the number of available units since the program started two years ago, said Daniel Davis, Threshold’s administrator and director of landlord relations for HOM, Inc. And without the support of federal funds through the ARPA, Davis said he doesn’t believe Threshold would have had the resources to match so many unhoused Arizonans with homes and subsidies for landlords.
Politics
New Biden rules deliver automatic cash refunds for canceled flights, ban surprise fees
In the aftermath of a canceled or delayed flight, there’s nothing less appealing than spending hours on the phone waiting to speak with an airline...
Trump says he would allow red states to track pregnancies, prosecute abortion ban violators
In an interview published by Time magazine this week, former president Donald Trump detailed his plans for a potential second term and said he would...
Local News
Arizona’s Democratic governor signs a bill to repeal 1864 ban on most abortions
PHOENIX (AP) — Democratic Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs has relegated a Civil War-era ban on most abortions to the past by signing a repeal bill...
VIDEO: Gov. Hobbs signs bill repealing Arizona’s 1864 abortion ban
@coppercourier Today Democratic @govhobbs signed a bill repealing Arizona's 1864 abortion ban. This doesn't mean the ban is gone now,...