Patrick Morrissy

6 Posts

Patrick Morrissy is the founder of HANDS Inc., a “neighborhood change CDC” based in Orange, New Jersey. He is a founder of Shelterforce, New Jersey Citizen Action, and the Housing and Community Development Network of New Jersey; and a board member of New Jersey Community Capital and the National Housing Institute.
Community Development Field

Scale, Schmale. What About Impact?

If you think what’s wrong with CDCs today is their failure to “go to scale,” you are looking in the fundamentally wrong direction, asking the wrong questions. While I do […]

Organizing

Community Stabilization: Are CDCs Up To The Task?

Imagine that it’s hurricane season, and 150 Katrinas are pounding poor neighborhoods — and the federal government response is totally inadequate. The community development movement faces two challenges: first, that […]

Housing

Staking On Community

As analysts probe the causes of the subprime foreclosure debacle, a couple of things seem clear about the solutions. First, few people will be helped by the current crop of […]

Uncategorized

Twin Pursuits

We know by now that effective community development requires more than just improving housing or neighborhood conditions. It involves community building: strengthening voluntary institutions and making democracy work through direct […]

Community Development Field

Community: Our Priority for the Next 20 Years

In 1975, when we published the first Shelterforce, a housing movement was growing amidst a culture of community organizing and protest. An optimistic Shelterforce Collective shared a vision of the […]

Policy

A Winning Strategy

The war on poverty in our inner cities will remain unwinnable until we redefine the terms of success and fully marshal our resources into making inner cities decent places to live.