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Equity

Using Multiple Community-Based Land Trusts to Save Farmland

Agrarian Commons closely resemble community land trusts, but they are unique in that they work collectively to provide long-term affordable and equitable access of small and mid-sized farms.

night out kids potato sack race
Interview

Celebrating a Different Definition of “Safety”

Night Out for Safety and Liberation provides an alternative to annual police-sponsored community events, and is growing in popularity around the nation.

Equity

Why Opportunity Neighborhoods Aren’t Really for Everyone

Families living in opportunity neighborhoods are seen as actively translating opportunity into real benefits through their actions. But, of course, this is not what really happens.

Financial System

Creative Ways to Finance Agriculture

In Montana, small family farms are disappearing at an alarming rate, and farmers and ranchers are unable to compete with giant agriculture mergers. But there are several ways to help improve the farmland accessibility issue.

Native women tan hide outside as part of a program called Indigenous Visionaries
Arts & Culture

The Next Generation of Indigenous Knowledge Keepers

A tribal college program works to preserve crucial Native American cultural elements while training indigenous women to step into leadership roles in their communities.

A small white fense with a sign that reads "welcome" and red flowers frame a resident-owned community in Wisconsin.
Reported Article

Taking Ownership Into Their Own Hands

Residents who live in manufactured housing communities across the U.S. are under threat of skyrocketing property values, predatory investors, and limited financing options. Can resident-owned communities stem the tide?

The outside of Karluck Manor, a housing-first facility that is helping to address the opioid epidemic.
Reported Article

Getting to the Heart of the Opioid Crisis

In some ways, dealing with the opioid epidemic is a natural fit for community development groups. At the heart, it’s often a problem of poverty: a lack of jobs and opportunities. Here’s how CDCs are using their skills to address the crisis.

Housing

The Rental Housing Crisis Is a Rural Issue Too

Much like urban communities, rural communities also face critical housing issues like rental shortages, a lack of federal and private funding to build new units, and the impending loss of affordability restrictions. Here’s what could help.

Interview

Changing the Way We Think About Poor Rural Communities

Rural communities are very different places—separated by climate, geography, and often race. But in many other ways, these communities are far more similar than different.

home with sold sign
Policy

Don’t Diminish the Importance of Homeownership in CRA Reform

A significant reduction in attention paid to home mortgage lending on CRA exams would be neither economically efficient nor equitable.

Editor’s Note

Shifting our Thinking About Rural Coverage

Shelterforce has had its comfort zones, and we’ve largely stayed within them. But it was time to shift our thinking so rural areas were more clearly part of the fold.

A deteriorated Brownsville home.
Equity

There Is an Emergency at the Border. It’s Poverty.

Targeted investments that address persistent poverty are necessary and should supersede financial support of a border wall.