BOSTON

In communities across Massachusetts, daily experience is making the once abstract notion of regional inequity painfully clear. Families of diverse income levels struggle to secure affordable housing, maintain decent employment, and feel secure about the environmental safety of their neighborhoods. Both urban and suburban commuters feel the impact of a transportation system that does not adequately address mass transit needs.

Achieving regional equity is no longer simply an issue for communities of color and low-income communities -- although there is no question that they are disproportionately impacted -- but the principal challenge facing Massachusetts in the 21st century.

PolicyLink has been partnering with Action for Regional Equity (Action!) -- 18 Massachusetts-based equity organizations – to:

• Make environmental justice and social equity central components of regional development;
• Integrate solutions to public transit, affordable housing, workforce development, and open space issues;
• Prevent displacement of low-income residents through mechanisms that connect them to opportunities, resources, and the political process; and
• Balance land use decisions across jurisdictions.

See a list of Action! members below.
Check out the PolicyLink Equitable Development Toolkit for a list of principles and tools.
Click here for the Transit Oriented Development tool.

Resources:

• Report: Promise and Challenge: Achieving Regional Equity in Greater Boston 
• Report: Community Controlled Housing for Massachusetts: Securing Affordability for the Long Term (download pdf)
• Report: Building the Line to Equity: Six Steps for Achieving Equitable Transit Oriented Development in Massachusetts (download pdf)
•  Transit Oriented Development Tool

Members:

Action! has been led from its inception by a talented team of dedicated equity advocates who guide its strategic direction, in cooperation with dozens of allied organizations and several hundred resident leaders.