The Employer Assisted Housing (EAH) Tool puts forth strategies to help working families secure affordable housing while also helping employers find and keep qualified workers, improve community relations, and revitalize neighborhoods. EAH is a flexible tool that can work in both "weak" and "hot" housing markets, while generating benefits for multiple stakeholders. Numerous financing options and policy supports can support EAH, including state tax credits, dedicated funding to match employer housing contributions, affordable housing trust funds, and passing the proposed Housing America's Workforce Act to create federal EAH tax credits. (See H.R. 1850 and S. 1078 for more information on this bill, and to send a letter of support, click here.) Check out the EAH Tool to find information on the advantages and challenges of EAH, innovative ways to finance it, and case studies of EAH in action.

Five years ago, PolicyLink launched the Equitable Development Toolkit to provide communities with tools to promote development without displacement, ensuring that neighborhood change and investment produces tangible benefits for current residents and healthier neighborhoods. In addition to the Employer Assisted Housing Tool mentioned above, there are tools for bringing healthy food retailers to underserved communities, promoting minority contracting, proposing local hiring strategies, advancing inclusionary zoning, and many others.

Now, PolicyLink would like to hear from you. We've developed an Equitable Development Toolkit Survey to find out which tools you find most helpful in your work, and what other tools you'd like to see. We'd also appreciate your opinion on issues relating to gentrification and community development. Your ideas and opinions matter. Please click here to participate in our survey.

Building on the success of the first National Inclusionary Housing Conference in Washington, D.C. in October 2005, the "Building Strong Mixed-Income Communities conference," held in San Francisco, CA on October 30-November 1 brought more than 250 advocates, agency representatives, nonprofit, and for-profit developers for a rich array of workshops and plenary sessions.

The conference was designed to provide participants with outstanding experts and resources in inclusionary housing and to mark the substantial progress of the field in advancing this important tool for achieving sustainable, mixed-income communities. At the conference, PolicyLink released Delivering on the Promise of Inclusionary Housing: Best Practices in Administration and Monitoring, written by Rich Jacobus--a report that examines best practices regarding the administration of inclusionary zoning programs.

In addition to valuable best practices, strategy sessions, and insights on how to address the challenges that inevitably arise with any Inclusionary Housing program effort, the conference also built bridges between key constituencies, who can often disagree over policy options, to address the affordable housing crisis.

Among the highlights of the event were a moving celebration of the more than 300 inclusionary housing policies now in effect nationally, an inspiring keynote address from PolicyLink founder and CEO Angela Glover Blackwell that framed the work in the context of social justice, closing remarks on the global import of housing as a human right from Carl Anthony, and new solidarity that was established between U.S. based organizations and a large and progressive delegation from South Africa. The co-conveners of the event are committed to keeping participants connected until the next event, anticipated in 2009.

PolicyLink is very pleased to announce EngagedInstitutions. org, a new website and online learning community dedicated to those working to create effective university-community partnerships and more community-engaged colleges and universities. The site provides a host of information and resources including news articles, events listings, an online resource library with links to policy and practice resources, and a bibliography of literature on engaged institutions. It was created to support cross-site learning and information sharing among participants in the W.K. Kellogg Foundation's Engaged Institutions project, which supports university-community partnership projects at four state universities (the University of Texas at El Paso, the University of California at Santa Cruz, the University of Minnesota/Twin Cities, and Pennsylvania State University) in their efforts to improve outcomes for children and youth while strengthening the overall commitment to community engagement within their university systems. PolicyLink is the cluster evaluator of this three-year effort which began in 2005.

The Drum Major Institute for Public Policy may have reached the next level of political mobilization. The New York-based think tank's new web platform, www.TheMiddleClass.org, offers a stunning example of how Web 2.0 technology and good old-fashioned progressive policy advocacy can join together for an incredibly effective political strategy.

The site, which highlights pending federal bills important to America's middle class, springboards off of a four-year-old DMI legislative scorecards initiative analyzing how well members of Congress represent the needs of the squeezed middle class and the aspirations of low-income Americans. But, as DMI says, "once a year just isn't enough." The new site is the next step to enable advocates to influence pending legislation, not simply react to it. The site enables users to track the progress of specific bills, contact important swing legislators, or view in-depth analyses of bills.

Make sure you check out www.TheMiddleClass.org. It is a great model and a potentially profoundly powerful tool.

"Toward a Transformative Agenda Around Race"
National conference and film festival hosted by The Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity at The Ohio State University

November 30 - December 2
Columbus, Ohio

Rockefeller Foundation Redevelopment Fellowship Department of Planning and Urban Studies Public Speaker Series

Join national and local leaders, who will discuss entrepreneurial approaches to large-scale urban redevelopment from the perspective of private, nonprofit, and public sector practitioners. View flyer for more details.

November 29 and December 6
New Orleans, Louisiana

Making Change Matter: Maximizing the Health Impact of the New WIC Foods
Watch for registration information at: calwic.org

January 16, 2008
Los Angeles, CA