Samaritan

Samaritan is a Seattle-based technology company that combines a mobile app, an online donor community and financial technology to help people experiencing homelessness meet housing, health care and other immediate needs. Participants, known as Samaritan Members or beacon holders, are enrolled through certified nonprofits, medical clinics and other care providers such as the Salvation Army and Mary's Place. Each participant receives a Bluetooth device called a beacon, also described as a smart wallet, which can store critical documents such as work permits, licenses and Social Security cards, and which carries a public-facing profile containing the person's first name and last initial, an optional photo, their story and their goals.

App users, called "samaritans," receive a notification when they come within roughly 20 yards of a beacon holder and can view the profile, give cashless donations, send written messages of encouragement, offer introductions or hire the person for work such as art or music. Profiles can also be browsed in the app without a physical encounter. Donated funds are redeemable at partner locations including supermarkets, second-hand clothing stores, coffee shops and clinics, or can be released at the discretion of a partner nonprofit representative or Samaritan staff. A general fund distributes donations across participants according to the goals they complete and actions they take. To keep a beacon active beyond 30 days, the holder must complete a life-care visit with a partner counselor, during which goals, progress and needs for the coming month are recorded in the app; partner organizations handle referrals to employment, treatment and housing resources. Members earn incentive payments of up to $20 for tasks such as scheduling a meeting with a care navigator or visiting a primary care provider.

Founding story

Founder Jonathan Kumar, then working at a technology startup, was prompted to act after watching a man in Seattle in November 2015 spend twenty minutes asking passersby for help with diabetes medication without anyone stopping; Kumar concluded the man was experiencing relational as well as financial poverty. By September 2016 the Samaritan app was in motion and the first beacon, or smart wallet, was issued to a person in need. Kumar, born to immigrant parents in poverty, studied informatics with a specialization in UX design at the University of Michigan, produced a documentary on social change and previously built FoodCircles, a tool for restaurants to convert surplus food into funding for local food banks.

Business model

Samaritan distributes beacons through nonprofit and clinical partners at no cost to the individual, while donations from app users and a general fund flow to participants as goal-linked incentives redeemable with partner merchants and service providers. The company originally expected city government to be its primary funding source and subsequently shifted toward health care organizations for research funding and revenue, positioning its platform around the cost that homelessness imposes on hospitals and public health systems.

Traction

The company's initial Seattle pilot distributed 500 beacons and its website reported 50 positive outcomes as of 2019. By 2019 press coverage, more than 10,000 app users had participated in the Seattle area, donors had invested about $100,000 in beacon holders and more than 1,000 notes of encouragement had been sent; the company reported that seven out of ten people approached opted to try the program. The company's site later reported 15,210 volunteer samaritans signed up, $178,812 invested into Samaritan Members and 302 members who reached housing, employment or other goals.

Latest developments

In April 2022 the California Health Care Foundation's Innovation Fund awarded Samaritan $200,000, citing the expansion of Medi-Cal into housing and case management services and Samaritan's partnership with a Southern California safety-net hospital and community health center network serving frequent emergency department users.