Business Wisdom in the High Country
In the Spring of 1992 Mike Loftin moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico, to become the new executive director of Neighborhood Housing Services, a small nonprofit engaged in home improvement […]
Creating Community Realty
When Sandy LeVan met with her broker at the beginning of her house search two years ago, he asked her two questions: Where she wanted to live and how much […]
The Last Line of Defense
The Cedar-Riverside neighborhood, on the west bank of the Mississippi River in the city of Minneapolis, is unique. In the 1960s a developer started buying up the community’s detached single-family […]
After Katrina: Fighting to Survive
I recently returned from Gulfport, Mississippi, a second home to this Yankee lawyer from the Midwest. I expected to find signs of Hurricane Katrina’s passage, painful but not overwhelming. What I […]
It Didn’t Begin With Katrina
We must always remember that New Orleans was suffering from an economic and political disaster long before Hurricane Katrina hit.
Moving Toward the Market
Most of us work in nonprofit organizations; many in community development corporations. In our nonprofit world, our “customers” are rarely the ones who pay our salaries. We rely instead on […]
Shelter Shorts
Home Loans for the Undocumented The Illinois Housing Development Authority will soon offer home mortgages to people who do not have social security numbers or a credit score. In the […]
Managing Grant Money
Jeff Anderson, of Oregon Community Foundation, says, “Don’t apply for a foundation grant unless you’re truly ready for the scrutiny of outsiders, regarding everything from your office’s appearance to the […]
The Fight to Save Section 8
In April 2004, when the Bush Administration launched a major assault on the program that helps Marion Brady pay her rent, she sprang into action. Though she suffers from a […]
Class Ties That Bind
Class Matters: Cross-Class Alliance Building for Middle-Class Activists, by Betsy Leondar-Wright. New Society Publishers, 2005, 192 pp. $18.95 (paperback). Just as I was completing this book review, Hurricane Katrina blew […]
Real Estate and Mortgage Licensing for CDCs
Research is a critical support for practice. It can uncover creative new approaches to old challenges, help us think about our work in a broader context and confirm or disprove […]