Tucson Standard

A policy report produced by The Goldwater Institute examining homelessness in Pima County shows that the rate of homelessness and the homeless population continues to rise throughout the area despite annual spending of at least $50 million to combat the issue.  

The Institute’s report details that Pima County has annually spent between $50 million and $70 million on homelessness, among federal, state, local and philanthropic sources. Reports from the county show total spending of $17.8 million from their budget alone in the last three years. 

According to the analysis by Goldwater, "Phoenix and Tucson’s spending on combating it is anything but transparent" and that both cities "have poured hundreds of millions of dollars into various efforts to fight homelessness, yet the homeless population remains stubbornly high and continues to grow.” Pima County does not report all contracts and spending related to fighting homelessness in a collective manner, so reports on their spending can not be guaranteed to be accurate. Other spending reports from the The Tucson Pima Collaboration to End Homelessness do not include breakdowns of where funding came from or how they calculated their totals. 

Austin VanDerHeyden, Municipal Affairs Liaison for the Goldwater Institute, appeared on a recent episode of the Grand Canyon Times podcast to discuss the report and the Institute’s efforts to help citizens in both Phoenix and Tucson affected by the issue of homelessness.

“The point of our property taxes is to receive the public services that the city provides, really owes to us. And when you’re not receiving those services, we think that you should be able to get a portion of your property tax back. And so it’s not going to fix the problem entirely, but it’s certainly going to help,” said VanDerHeyden. "If you’ve had to build a fence up to, to block off your property, hire private security, put in a security system, whatever it may be, you can take off a portion or file a tax credit to receive a portion of your property taxes back."  

According to the report, in the past several years, homelessness has risen dramatically Pima County, which includes Tucson, as well as throughout Maricopa County. 

Established in 1998 and based in Phoenix, The Goldwater Institute is a nonprofit public policy research and litigation organization, which promotes free-market principles and limited government. Named after U.S. Senator Barry Goldwater (R-AZ), the Institute conducts research, provides policy recommendations and engages in litigation to protect individual rights and state sovereignty. It focuses on various policy areas, including education, healthcare and property rights.

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What were Pima County's largest contracts in their effort to fight homelessness?

Organization	Amount	Purpose
World Dining LLC	$13,400,000	Food
City of Tucson	$6,046,272	Emergency Food & Shelter
Our Family Services Inc.	$1,749,880	Housing, Rapid Rehousing, Rental Assistance, and Case Management
Compass Affordable Housing Inc.	$850,000	Housing
Interfaith Community Services	823,384.00	Utility, Rental, and Mortgage Assistance
Community Bridges Inc.	752,477.00	Housing, Employment, and Substance Abuse services
Catholic Community Services of So Arizona Inc. PIO Decimo Center	562,386.00	Transitional Housing for Families, Childcare

**source: Goldwater Institute