GiveBetter x SF

Youth ALIVE!

Whole-gift violence prevention, intervention and healing

Research time: ~8 min on GPT-6 Astra Lite + GPT-5.6 Sol
  • Research — reviewed programs, finances and impact evidence.

Published: 10 September 2026.

Donate

Summary

What do they do? Youth ALIVE! (EIN 94-3143254) serves Oakland through Caught in the Crossfire hospital intervention, violence interruption, Pathways mentoring, Teens on Target, counseling, homicide-family support and advocacy. More

Why this approach interests us

  • Locally pioneered hospital-based peer intervention addresses violent reinjury, with encouraging but low-quality pooled evidence.

Our main reservations

  • The organization's uncontrolled non-reinjury rate is not a causal effect. A current $5M state award makes new-gift additionality uncertain, and the QALY anchor is a model with important limitations.

What do you get for your dollar?

Our signed prior-weighted illustration is $27.34M donor / $28.08M gross resources per 10 modeled QALYs. All quantified benefit is in Oakland/Alameda. The favorable 5% scenario supplies 66.1% of expected benefit; this is not a verified marginal donation offer. Inspect the model, assumptions and scenarios.

modeled ordinary gift
$27.34M — donor cost per 10 signed expected QALYs; gross $28.08M
central
$14.29M — donor cost per 10; gross $15.04M
favorable
$2.07M — 5% weight; 66.10% of signed expectation
bay / sf
100% / 0% — all quantified service is Oakland/Alameda; SF nested
rfmf
Unverified — $5M current CalVIP award; no priced next-gift use

1. What do they do?

Youth ALIVE! (EIN 94-3143254) serves Oakland through Caught in the Crossfire hospital intervention, violence interruption, Pathways mentoring, Teens on Target, counseling, homicide-family support and advocacy.

Reach survivors at the bedside

Caught in the Crossfire specialists offer safety, healing and practical support after violent injury, aiming to prevent retaliation and recurrence.

Support youth, families and neighborhoods

2025 reported 118 CiC clients, 260 mediations, 131 bedside assessments, 72 Pathways youth, 70 families, 91 counseling clients/3,255 hours; overlap unknown. These counts are not summed as distinct beneficiaries.

Change practice and policy

Youth ALIVE supports community prevention and advocacy; replication and policy spillovers receive no modeled QALYs.

Scope of this review. All gift cash is charged. Only CiC-like service receives QALYs; violence interruption, Pathways, TNT, counseling, family support, and policy are zero-credit. FY2024 whole-organization expense was $7,305,670. Program allocation is a judgment, not an observed expense share; this is a partial-health model of a whole gift.

2. Monitoring and information sharing

Chong et al. 2015 + NICE Appendix H

local five-year undiscounted healthcare-payer Markov model. 4.64 vs 4.62 modeled QALYs = .020/participant

Our assessment. not observed donor impact; NICE found potentially serious limitations; published $3,015/$3,515 comparator-cost and ICER records conflict

Jawa et al. 2026

systematic review/meta-analysis. 10 pooled studies, OR .60 (95% CI .38-.94)

Our assessment. low-quality evidence; I2 64.7%; conditional recommendation

Youth ALIVE 2025

uncontrolled program reporting. 118 CiC clients; 96% not reinjured

Our assessment. no concurrent counterfactual; complement is not effectiveness

3. Qualitative assessment

Locally pioneered hospital-based peer intervention addresses violent reinjury, with encouraging but low-quality pooled evidence.

Key reservations

  • The five-year QALY anchor is modeled, not trial-measured; the source has potentially serious limitations.
  • Uncontrolled 96% non-reinjury is not 96% effectiveness.
  • 2026 pooled evidence is low quality and heterogeneous.
  • Current contract funding may displace new donations.
  • Ordinary-gift allocation, marginal client price and external resources are uncertain.
  • Other portfolio benefits remain unquantified, not proven absent.

Benefits not included in our estimate

  • Violence interruption
  • Pathways and Teens on Target
  • Counseling and family support outside the credited CiC course
  • Statewide policy and national replication
  • Criminal-justice and economic benefits

4. What do you get for your dollar?

$27.34M per 10 modeled Bay Area QALYs; giving HOLD.

Only an additional CiC-like course receives quantified health. The directly reported five-year modeled difference is 4.64−4.62=.020 QALY per participant, reduced by evidence-transfer and gift-additionality priors. No lifetime extrapolation is added.

A better life is our comparison unit of 10 additional quality-adjusted life years (QALYs), potentially spread across people. These are uncertain estimates, not measured returns or verified donation offers.

How we calculate the estimate

CENTRAL GIFT: $100,000 × 40% allocation × 35% additionality × 90% realization ÷ $1,800 × .020 QALY × 50% transfer
0.070 QALY; $14.29M donor / $15.04M gross per10

Model inputs and assumptions
CiC allocation
40% central (range: 20%–70%). The ordinary gift spans the full organization. Other activities retain costs but receive no separate health credit. Low; analyst prior.
Funding additionality and realization
35% × 90% (range: 15%–60% additionality; 80%–95% realization). Public contracts and the new state award may fund activity without the gift. Enrollment and completion also constrain delivery. Low; analyst priors.
Cost per added client
$1,800 (range: $1,484.97–$2,500). The favorable floor is $267,294 divided by 180 minimum comprehensive clients in the July2023–September2024 county contract. It is not a current marginal offer or complete resource cost. Low; historical benchmark plus judgments.
Five-year QALY anchor
4.64−4.62=.020 (range: −25% / 0% / 20% / 50% / 90% transfer). NICE summarizes a five-year undiscounted healthcare-payer Markov model, not observed trial QALYs. Potentially serious limitations and no probabilistic sensitivity analysis. Negative transfer represents a harm stress. Limited modeled evidence; transfer is judgmental.
External resources per realized client
$750 central (range: $300–$1,500). Induced partner/clinical/housing/education resources are added to all donor cash; incomplete, not a lower bound. Index-injury emergency costs excluded; avoided costs not netted. Very low; unsourced sensitivity.
Bay / SF share
100% / 0% (range: fixed credited-service boundary). Quantified CiC-like delivery is Oakland/Alameda. No direct SF delivery or additional policy/replication spillover is credited. Service-scope attribution.

Illustrative $100,000 unrestricted gift

  • Harm 10%: −0.0048 QALY. Signed burden stress, not an observed Youth ALIVE harm.
  • Null 35%: Not defined. No positive QALY; cost ratios null.
  • Cautious positive 35%: $147.06M donor / $150.81M gross. 0.0068 gift QALY.
  • Central 15%: $14.29M donor / $15.04M gross. 0.070 gift QALY.
  • Favorable 5%: $2.07M donor / $2.23M gross. 0.483647 QALY; 66.1% of signed expected benefit.
  • Signed expectation: $27.34M donor / $28.08M gross. 0.036582 QALY; removing the favorable case gives $76.61M donor per10.

Uncertainty. Weights and transfer inputs are analyst priors, not confidence intervals. Zero funding produces zero QALYs and null cost/geography/tail ratios. Published cost records conflict: PubMed reports $3,574/$3,515 and a $2,941 ICER; NICE reports $3,574/$3,015 and $27,950. We use the directly reported QALY difference rather than reverse-engineering a preferred cost pair.

5. Funding and previous grants

Obtain the current CalVIP budget, unique referral/enrollment/completion and waitlist flow, comparison-group outcomes, partner resources and a priced next-gift staffing plan.

FY2024 revenue $8.894M, expense $7.306M, surplus $1.588M and net assets $5.186M; $5.379M program-service revenue. A $5M CalVIP Cohort5 award covers April2026–September2029, with service through March2029. This is funding, not modeled health. No current waitlist, restricted-award budget or priced next-client plan is verified. Health-producing marginal room remains unpriced.

This review does not establish a verified marginal funding offer or a complete history of grants.

Donate

Opens the organization’s giving page. A general donation may not fund the specific activity modeled here; confirm allocation with the recipient.

6. Sources

  1. 2025 results. Youth ALIVE!. Official uncontrolled outcomes. Published: 2025 reporting; retrieved: 2026-09-10.
  2. Caught in the Crossfire. Youth ALIVE!. Official program. Published: Undated/current; retrieved: 2026-09-10.
  3. Ways to donate. Youth ALIVE!. Official donation and EIN. Published: Undated/current; retrieved: 2026-09-10.
  4. Historical Youth ALIVE service contract. Alameda County. Official contract. Published: 2024-07-09; retrieved: 2026-09-10.
  5. Hospital violence intervention cost-effectiveness. Chong et al.. Peer-reviewed model. Published: 2015; retrieved: 2026-09-10.
  6. Rehabilitation After Traumatic Injury, Appendix H. NICE. Independent evidence appraisal. Published: 2022; retrieved: 2026-09-10.
  7. Hospital-based violence intervention systematic review. Jawa et al.. Peer-reviewed systematic review. Published: 2026-08-18; retrieved: 2026-09-10.
  8. Oakland violence intervention evaluation. Becker et al.. Retrospective matched evaluation. Published: 2004; retrieved: 2026-09-10.
  9. Youth Alive EIN94-3143254. IRS via ProPublica. IRS filing. Published: FY2024; filed2025-07-18; retrieved: 2026-09-10.
  10. CalVIP Cohort5 funding recommendations. California BSCC. Official funding recommendations. Published: 2026-02; retrieved: 2026-09-10.

Annual expenses: years and sources

Average annual expenses (three consecutive fiscal years): $6,371,915. Organization size is separate from the modeled cost-effectiveness of a donation.

Youth Alive

Form 990/990-EZ reported whole-entity expenses; includes program, administration and fundraising costs, but excludes any costs netted against revenue.

Original returns checked for legal identity, full-year period and total expenses. Latest three linked original returns.