September National Equity Atlas Update

The Atlas is announcing the beta version of a new feature that highlights the equity movement on-the-ground:
 
Preview neighborhood-level mapping added to the Atlas
Today, we released the beta version of new interactive neighborhood-level mapping on the Atlas. These new maps allow users to understand how selected indicators (e.g., unemployment) vary across neighborhoods within a city or region, and can help inform targeted employment and workforce development initiatives as well as infrastructure investments. This beta release features county and census-tract level maps of the unemployment indicator. Register for our special preview of the maps on October 6 specifically for Atlas subscribers and share your feedback ahead of the public release next month.
 
Welcoming America webinar
Welcoming America helps communities across the country achieve prosperity by becoming more welcoming toward immigrants and all residents. On October 7 the National Equity Atlas will be featured in a webinar on eelcoming and economic development. Participants will examine selected economic indicators on the Atlas to get a sense of how immigrants are faring in their communities. Angel Ross, Research Associate at PolicyLink and Justin Scoggins, Data Manager at the USC Program for Environmental and Regional Equity (PERE) are featured speakers. Register here.
 
Forward Community Investments webinar
Last week, the National Equity Atlas kicked off the Forward Community Investments 2016-2017 Racial Equity Webinar Series. The goal of this series is to provide FCI partners with tools and approaches that can be used to advance social, racial, and economic equity and inclusion within their work. The webinar provided an overview of the Atlas framework and a walk through of the Atlas, focusing specifically on Wisconsin.

New Report Makes Case for Equity in Metro Atlanta
A new report from the Partnership for Southern Equity (PSE), Growing the Future: The Case for Economic Inclusion in Metro Atlanta, describes how equity is both a moral and economic imperative for the Atlanta region and for the nation as a whole. The report highlights our full employment analysis and GDP with racial equity analysis, both of which underscore how eliminating racial inequities results in “equity dividends” for the broader economy. See our short post about the report here.

New “Chart of the Week” series
We've launched a new "Chart of the Week" series to add equity data about growth and prosperity to the national dialogue. Every week, we post a new chart drawing from the Equity Atlas related to current events and issues. Our inaugural post lifted up #BlackWomensEqualPay and looked at median wages for Black women in Atlanta, Georgia. We also shared charts highlighting the #Fightfor15, #NoDAPL, and the most recent Census report. Follow our posts on social media using #equitydata, #Fightfor15, and #NoDAPL and in our Data in Action section.

Foundations to Reinvest in One of Nation’s Strongest Networks of Support for Entrepreneurs

The New Economy Initiative (NEI), an entrepreneurial infrastructure building initiative for Detroit and Southeast Michigan, has granted a total of $96.2 million to organizations and programs supporting entrepreneurs since it launched in 2007.

According to analysis conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP (PwC) and the W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, NEI’s support has helped entrepreneurs and small businesses generate $2.9 billion in real economic output and create 17,490 jobs in southeast Michigan.

“Detroit’s evolution from recovering region to thriving economy demands more than just creating new businesses or restoring buildings. NEI is proving that intentional focus on equity and inclusion is driving Detroit’s ‘new economy.’” Angela Glover Blackwell, Founder and President, PolicyLink

NEI has achieved this impact by making grants to organizations and programs supporting entrepreneurs of all kinds, from grass roots to high growth, creating a vast network of entrepreneurial support in southeast Michigan. The economic and employment impact reports by PwC and Upjohn Institute analyzed years of information reported to NEI by grantees via quarterly reports, as well as interviews with regional entrepreneurs.

Findings include:

  • 4,400 companies directly serviced by NEI grantees through 2015
  • 179,571 attendees of events in metro Detroit’s entrepreneurial network
  • More than 1 million square feet of entrepreneurial space activated
  • $232 million in additional program dollars matched by NEI grantees
  • $1.9 billion in real gross domestic product generated by NEI-supported companies
  • $2.9 billion in real output generated by NEI-supported companies
  • 17,490 jobs created by NEI-supported companies, 70% of which are located in Wayne County.

 

For more information, read the full press release from NEI and download the full report.

Beyond Affordable Housing: Creating Opportunities in Every Community

Cross-posted from Living Cities: This blog post is part of the Living Cities series “Closing the Racial Gaps: Together We Can” which highlights efforts across the United States that show promise for closing racial opportunity gaps and creating a more equitable future.

Nearly 30 years ago I attended a community development conference focused on replacing decrepit housing in poor, mostly black, inner-city neighborhoods with attractive, affordable dwellings. The leaders in the room saw housing rehabilitation and new construction as the way to revitalize poor communities and improve the lives of the people who lived there. I was uncomfortable with the discussion and began asking: Why would community developers build housing in communities cut off from good schools, jobs, transportation, parks—the resources that people need to thrive and succeed? Is better housing the answer to inequality and injustice?

When I raised these issues, the response was not positive, but more like: “Who let her in?” And it was not just the mostly white community development leaders who pushed back. Black leaders and residents resisted my questioning the efficacy of focusing on rebuilding housing in severely depressed neighborhoods as the way to improve life outcomes. I decided to educate myself more about community development and find a better way to express my concern.

Read the full post on the Living Cities website>>>

25 Disruptive Leaders Who Are Working to Close the Racial Opportunity Gaps

 
Living Cities unveils 25 Disruptive Leaders list, recognizing remarkable individuals who are shaking up the status quo and creating new approaches to address our nation’s most stubborn challenges.
 
 
In celebration of Living Cities 25th Anniversary, Living Cities recognize 25 Disruptive Leaders who are working to improve economic outcomes for low-income people in America’s cities. The list recognizes activists, government employees, artists, community members, entrepreneurs, elected officials and philanthropists from across the country who are committed to addressing racial disparities; empowering and mobilizing others to do the same. In these challenging times, we are more convinced than ever that this type of bold leadership not only is required, but must be celebrated. We believe that their work and leadership embody what’s possible when we lead and work together differently towards a more equitable America.
 
What is a Disruptive Leader?
 
Disruptive Leaders act with urgency and unrestrained imagination. They take risks, put their own personal capital on the line to challenge the status quo, work to take down the barriers that cause racial disparities and embrace the responsibility to question, collaborate and lead for lasting and meaningful change.
 
America’s Top 25 Disruptive Leaders
 
The changes we need to see in cities won’t happen by luck or chance, but by a different type of leadership. These 25 leaders represent a diversity of sectors, roles and experiences. What they share, however, is a deep-seated impatience with the status quo, a willingness to act and to bring others along with them.
 
Join Living Cities to celebrate and congratulate the diverse leaders who make up the #Disruptive25! 
 
The List: 25 Disruptive Leaders
 
Mayor Steve Adler
Mayor Adler was elected Austin’s 52nd Mayor in December 2014. He is leading Austin towards a new level of inclusive civic engagement between residents and their elected officials. Mayor Adler practiced civil rights law for many years and served nearly ten years as Chief of Staff and General Counsel for Texas State Senator Eliot Shapleigh, working primarily on school finance, equity and access issues. He has been deeply involved with, and has chaired, many Austin civic and non-profit institutions over the past 20 years.
 
Nancy O. Andrews
Nancy O. Andrews is the president and CEO of the Low Income Investment Fund (LIIF). Since 1984, LIIF has served 1.7 million Americans, investing $1.5 billion to create, enhance and preserve affordable housing, child care centers, schools, healthy food retail, health clinics, green facilities and transit-oriented development in distressed neighborhoods nationwide. LIIF is trailblazing new ways to tie together housing and health and to measure the social value of investments through their Social Impact Calculator.
 
Tawanna Black
Tawanna Black, Executive Director for the Northside Funders Group, is a nationally recognized thought leader, well known for influencing, inspiring and equipping cross-sector leaders to transform personal convictions into actions that produce equitable and thriving communities. The Northside Funders Group is a place-based, collective impact organization of 20 corporate, community and private foundations and public sector investors committed to aligning investments and strategies to advance equity, build social capital and extend the prosperity of the Twin Cities to one of its most impoverished neighborhoods.
 
Angela Glover Blackwell
Angela Glover Blackwell is the President, CEO and Founder of PolicyLink, the leading voice for “equity as a superior growth model” and the movement to use public policy to improve access and opportunity for all low-income people and communities of color in the areas of health, housing, transportation, education and infrastructure. Prior to founding PolicyLink, she was a Senior Vice President at the Rockefeller Foundation and, as a lawyer, founded the Oakland (CA) Urban Strategies Council. In 2010, Ms. Glover Blackwell co-authored “Uncommon Common Ground: Race and America’s Future.”
 
Raj Chetty
Raj Chetty is a Professor of Economics at Stanford University, and recipient of both a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship and the John Bates Clark medal, given by the American Economic Association to the best American economist under age 40. Chetty’s research combines empirical evidence and economic theory to help design more effective government policies. His current research focuses on equality of opportunity, seeking to address the question of how to give children from disadvantaged backgrounds better chances of succeeding.
 
Ta-Nehisi Coates
Ta-Nehisi Coates is a journalist, blogger and memoirist who brings personal reflection and historical scholarship to bear on America’s most contested issues. Writing without shallow polemic and in a measured style, Coates addresses complex and challenging issues such as racial identity, systemic racial bias, and urban policing. Coates is a national correspondent for The Atlantic. His most recent book, “Between the World and Me,” was released in July 2015. It won the 2015 National Book Award for Nonfiction. He was the recipient of a “Genius Grant” from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation in 2015.
 
Jason DeParle:
Jason DeParle is a reporter for The New York Times, based in Washington. For more than 20 years, he has written extensively about issues involving poverty. A two-time finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and a recipient of the George Polk Award, his first book, “American Dream: Three Women, Ten Children, and a Nation’s Drive to End Welfare,” won the Helen Bernstein Award from the New York City Public Library.
 
Martin Eakes
Martin Eakes is the co-founder and CEO of Self-Help and the Center for Responsible Lending. Self-Help has proven that access to responsible savings, loans and transactions is critical for promoting financial security, family health and improved opportunity for low-income families. Since 1998, Self-Help’s Community Advantage Program has helped more than 50,000 lower-income families, especially those of color, to become homeowners in 48 states. In 2008, Self-Help Federal Credit Union was formed to build a network of credit union branches to operate on an uncommon scale. It now has 22 branches, $600 million in assets, and serves over 80,000 people in three states.
 

All-In Cities: Building Momentum in Pittsburgh, New Orleans, Detroit, and Indianapolis

 

As America’s cities experience a comeback, city leaders need to implement bold strategies to ensure no one is left behind or displaced. All should have the opportunity to contribute to building new urban economies that are equitable, sustainable, and prosperous. Through the All-In Cities initiative, PolicyLink empowers city officials, community advocates, and other civic leaders with the policy ideas, data, and hands-on assistance to make racial economic inclusion and equitable growth their reality. We’ve had an exciting week full of milestones:

Pittsburgh: Equitable Development

Today, more than one hundred community leaders gathered at the August Wilson Center in Pittsburgh for the release of Equitable Development: The Path to an All-In Pittsburgh, produced in partnership with Neighborhood Allies and Urban Innovation21. Mayor William Peduto, City Council Member Daniel Lavelle, and other leaders from government, business, and the nonprofit sector discussed the recommendations. Follow the conversation on social media at #AllInPittsburgh. 

Indianapolis: Equitable Innovation Economies

Since 2014, New York, Indianapolis, Portland and San Jose have been piloting new approaches to advancing equity in innovation and manufacturing through the Equitable Innovation Economies Initiative, a multi-year project led by the Pratt Center for Community Development in collaboration with PolicyLink and the Urban Manufacturing Alliance (UMA). Yesterday at the UMA national convening in Indianapolis, we released a new report, Prototyping Equity: Local strategies for a more inclusive innovation economy, documenting the groundbreaking efforts of these cities. Join the conversation at #proequity.

New Orleans: #EquityNewOrleans

PolicyLink is advising the city of New Orleans in the development of its citywide equity strategy. On Tuesday, September 13, the city held its second community listening session to discuss how the city can integrate racial equity throughout its activities. Learn about the initiative at www.equityneworleans.org and participate at #EquityNewOrleans. 
 

Detroit: New Economy Initiative Impact 

On Wednesday, September 14, the New Economy Initiative released a report highlighting its impact. Since 2007, the unique funder collaborative has helped build an inclusive entrepreneurial ecosystem in Detroit, providing direct support to over 4,400 companies, helping launch more than 1,600 new companies (39 percent of them owned by people of color and 32 percent by women), and creating more than 17,000 jobs. PolicyLink has advised the initiative on its equity strategy since 2009.

Learn more about our All-In Cities initiative and sign up for updates at www.allincities.org.

  

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