Control of Farmland, City Style
I have thought a lot lately about the issue of land ownership for farmers, and the barriers they face to buying land so they can plan for growing their business and serving more food consumers. This issue really matters on the edges of metropolitan areas, where farmers can find lucrative markets for their products and […]
HUD Announces NSP2 Grants
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development announced this morning the long-awaited list of grantees for the second round of the Neighborhood Stabilization...
Smart at the Roots
Smart growth principles can’t be imposed from the outside.
Using Business as a Force For Good
B Corps are for-profit businesses that focus strongly on their social and environmental impact. The movement has grown to 1,800-plus worldwide and now cities, economic authorities, and activists are trying to attract more of these mission-driven and worker-friendly companies to help spur economic growth.
Evergreen Cooperatives Sows Sustainable Jobs with New Greenhouse
If my food shopping habits can in any way predict the success of the latest Evergreen Cooperatives initiative than they're in luck.
Every year I...
Manufactured Locally
While there is much debate about the state of large-scale domestic manufacturing, a few places are quietly supporting local manufacturing for items that have been made overseas for some time, from jewelry to jeans.
Pushing Opportunity Zones to Fulfill Their Promise
Some guidelines to ensure that Opportunity Zones are transformational and not transactional.
Put Your Spending Where Your Goals Are
Local procurement policies take money already being spent and direct it to local businesses to get more economic development benefit for the buck.
Strengthening the CRA
In 1995, the last time federal banking agencies revised the rules of the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA), they promised to conduct a follow-up review...
CDCs Step In Where Banks Fear to Tread
Early in 2010, the Congressional Oversight Panel for the Troubled Asset Relief Program released a report indicating that half of the $1.4 trillion in...
Is Your Town a Parasite?
What would you do if someone told you your town, the place you'd grown up in and where you had...
Building the Cars of the Future . . . in Detroit
How the nonprofit Focus: HOPE is helping to bring manufacturing jobs back to Detroit, and the Detroiters who need them.
CRA Modernization: A Critical Moment for Underserved Neighborhoods
The Community Reinvestment Act and the Consumer Financial Protection Agency Act hold great promise for the creation of a more financially inclusive nation, but both depend on critical "moments in time" in Congress that will determine whether they become good laws or are weakened beyond recognition
Farming With Benefits
One of the many striking commercials that aired during Sunday’s Super Bowl was a celebration of the American farmer, although...
How the New Market Tax Credit Program Could Actually Benefit Communities
The New Markets Tax Credit (NMTC) program was created in 2000, with a goal of creating “jobs and material improvement...
Clearing a Path to Employment for Veterans
Veterans tend to have many job skills—but translating that into civilian employment is often harder than it should be.
Walt Weighs In On The Economy
So this is weird: December 5 is Walt Disney’s birthday and I get these two separate Disney things in the e-mail from different people...
Tracking Job Creation in the Nonprofit Sector
Rick Cohen, a long-time Shelterforce contributor and editor of The Nonprofit Quarterly‘s “Cohen Report” wrote last week on the importance of nonprofits tracking their...
In Detroit, the Fight for Community Benefits Begins Anew
For equitable development activists, Detroit’s Community Benefits Ordinance may seem like major progress. And it is—just not how they may imagine it to be.
Time to Bet on Prize-Linked Savings
During 15 years of working within a community development corporation to create and support socially and economically resilient communities, one of my perpetual frustrations...