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Earn It! Keep It! Save It! (EKS)

A Good Idea

Description

The goal of Earn It! Keep It! Save It! (EKS) is to help low-income families become financially stable, primarily through free tax return preparation and access to asset building and income support resources.

EKS is implemented by a coalition of organizations in the Bay Area. Altogether there are 211 free tax sites where volunteer tax preparers who have been IRS-certified provide free tax preparation and work to ensure that eligible, low-income families claim valuable tax credits such as the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC).

Goal / Mission

The goal of Earn It! Keep It! Save It! is to help low-income families become financially stable.

Results / Accomplishments

Since 2003, Earn It! Keep It! Save It! (EKS) has helped return over $211 million in refunds to low- and moderate-income households in the San Francisco Bay Area. In the 2010 tax season, 3,949 EKS volunteers worked to file 51,963 tax returns. These tax returns helped Bay Area residents gather over $57 million in total refunds, including over $18 million from the Earned Income Tax Credit.

About this Promising Practice

Organization(s)
United Way of the Bay Area
Primary Contact
1970 Broadway, Suite 600
Oakland, CA 94612
(510) 238-2418
VITA@uwba.org
http://www.earnitkeepitsaveit.org/
Topics
Economy / Investment & Personal Finance
Organization(s)
United Way of the Bay Area
Date of publication
2010
Date of implementation
2003
Geographic Type
Urban
Location
San Francisco Bay Area, CA
For more details
Target Audience
Families
Healthy Marin