History and Overview of the Initiative

In 2000, the IRS indicated that hard working people in Tempe and Guadalupe were leaving $3 - $8 million of EITCs unclaimed each year. By not claiming the EITC, they were missing out on dollars that could help them meet basic needs or get ahead. Our communities were also missing out, because many of these dollars would have been spent locally. In 2002, TCC created a partnership of Tempe, Guadalupe and the IRS and implemented the Earned Income Tax Credit Initiative, a 3-year pilot project that ended in June 2005. The goals were to increase awareness of the EITC and the number of working people who claimed it. The pilot project enjoyed significant success bringing nearly $7.4 million additional EITCs to our hard working individuals and families and to our communities.

Two years ago, after completion of the pilot project, Tempe Community Council (TCC), the City of Tempe and the IRS joined forces with Newtown Community Development Corporation and Tempe Schools Credit Union to better educate Tempe residents and workers on how to best use their tax refunds to achieve financial stability. We decided to embrace a more challenging goal - “helping hard working people and their families become financially stable and ultimately become homeowners in our community” and assumed a new name – Tempe Earned Income Tax Credit and Asset Development Initiative.

Our target population is Tempe residents and workers at or below 80% of Area Median Income, adjusted for family size. As a general guideline, our target populations consists of individuals earning $35,000 or less and families earning $55,000 or less.

We broadened our target population, Initiative goal and scope of activities, because research shows that greater income alone is not enough to empower working people with low wages to achieve independence. The pathway out of poverty is through saving and accumulation of significant assets such as a home and an education. Accumulating assets like these leads to important psychological and social effects that are not achieved to the same degree by receiving and spending an equivalent amount of regular income. Research shows that acquiring a home, an education for oneself or ones children, a comfortable retirement and other assets like these provide important long term independence for families which in turn, benefits our community.

In our community, the homeownership rate is 51%, substantially lower than the rate for Maricopa County. While many Tempe residents and working people with low wages have steady employment, they face numerous barriers to homeownership. The Initiative recognizes that the first steps toward addressing these barriers is to help our families learn the basics of household budgeting, increasing their income and starting to save and to make affordable savings and homeownership opportunities more readily available to them.

Since July, 2005, when the new Initiative began, TCC has focused its efforts year round on creating public awareness among individuals and local businesses of the free financial workshops available in our community to workers with low wages. Beginning in January 2008, through collaboration with area non-profit organizations, we will offer free workshops throughout the year on important topics including budgeting, credit, purchasing insurance, car buying and basic investing.

Free tax preparation will be offered at the Tempe Supersite located at Tempe Schools Credit Union, 2800 South Mill Ave, Tempe 85281 on Saturdays from 9:00 AM – 12:00 PM beginning January 26, 2008. The Tempe Supersite will remain open through Saturday April 12, 2008, but will be closed on March 15 for spring break.

[1] Census data.

Our Initiative has three components:

1) Free Tax Preparation and Electronic Filing

2) Free Budgeting, Credit, and Homebuyer Workshops for Tempe Residents and Employees

3) Federal Tax Credits and Local Asset Development Resources

To become a Volunteer Tax Preparer or Translator