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Municipal Bank of LA: Democratic Governance Frameworks

May 11, 2023

This briefing explores how a municipally-owned financial institution could directly incorporate citizens' input into investment decisions.Noting Los Angeles's historical inequalities, the briefing highlights the need for a direct public voice in the day-to-day governance of a public financial institution. In describing the shortcomings of elections, public comment, and other well-established modes of democratic practice, the briefing makes the case for the use of deliberative democracy or decisions taken by randomly-selected groups of citizens to fill this need.Using contemporary and historical examples of deliberative democracy from Paris, East Belgium, Bogotá, and Ancient Rome, the briefing goes on to propose a new governing architecture for a bank in which key governance functions are performed by these citizens' panels.

Transforming Communities One Grant at a Time: Impact Report 2023

May 3, 2023

This report features stories of our communities coming together to address needs. Donors with similar passions have co-invested to support important programs and projects. Organizations have found new, meaningful ways to collaborate. And funders are taking risks and encouraging grantees to experiment with new approaches to solving long-standing challenges.

An Exciting Time of Transition: 2022 Annual Report

May 2, 2023

The Annual Report you are about to read recaps the year that was 2022, and our team stepped up in remarkable ways - working together to emerge from a global pandemic, raising more than $75 million and making $84 million in grants to approximately 2,400 nonprofit organizations. We remain ranked among the nation's 20 largest community foundations by asset size, and in a year when the S&P 500 was down 18.1 percent, our endowment return was down only 10.6 percent, which ranked in the top quartile of endowments nationwide.Most importantly, in 2022, we were laser focused on ways to aid Rhode Islanders who have been historically marginalized, and those struggling to make ends meet - by battling inequity, hunger, surging housing prices, educational gaps, behavioral health challenges, economic insecurity, and more, through our grantmaking and civic leadership efforts.The year 2022 also launched the Foundation into an exciting time of transition. While our dedicated staff, under the inspired leadership of Neil Steinberg, stayed focused on fundraising and grantmaking, the Board of Directors took on the search for the Foundation's next President and CEO. After a thoughtful, thorough national search that included significant community input, our next President and CEO, David Cicilline, was unanimously appointed.Times of transition can be both exciting and challenging. Committed to continuity, we are stewards of a 107-year-old legacy of generosity and impact. We have flourished though more than one global pandemic, economic ups and downs, war times, and times of peace and prosperity, a continuous source of hope and a community resource. We will continue to be so.We are humbled by the generosity of our donors and the incredible dedication of our nonprofit partners, and we know you will feel the same as you read through these pages.

The South Has Something to Say - An Examination of Student Loan Debt in the South Part One: Atlanta

April 13, 2023

This paper series is an expansion of the Student Borrower Protection Center's exploration of the geography of student debt disparities and the economic distress that borrowers of color, particularly those who are Black and Latino, face in the student loan market. Research has increasingly shed light on the vast racial disparities present in the student debt crisis. Beyond rising balances and unaffordable monthly bills, student debt has far-reaching effects on the lived experience of student loan borrowers and the communities in which they live.In 2020, the SBPC published Disparate Debts, an examination of racial disparities in student debt burdens and borrower distress across US cities in general and in DC, Philadelphia, New York, and San Francisco in particular. Expanding on Disparate Debts, this series, Student Debt in the South, leverages previous work to examine the intersection of race and student debt throughout the South, including efforts to highlight the burdens that student loan borrowers face in both cities and rural communities.As a part of the Student Loan Law Initiative (SLLI) and in partnership with the University of California Berkeley, we have analyzed proprietary data from the University of California Consumer Credit Panel (UCCCP) data on the far-reaching effects of student debt in several metropolitan and rural areas across the South. The descriptive and demographic insights gleaned from these data help us understand the local effects of rising student debt and borrower distress and to underscore where the student debt crisis disproportionately affects certain communities, particularly communities of color.The first report in this series focuses on the city of Atlanta, providing a case study on the effects of student debt on the Black middle class and the shifting impacts of student debt on communities of color over the past decade.

The Next Reconstruction: Examining the Call for a National Reparations Program

March 30, 2023

In this brief, we examine the evolution of reparations proposals in the United States, connect a national reparations program to the United Nations' international human rights standards around reparations, and discuss the potential of a national reparations program to close long-standing racial gaps in wealth, housing, education, criminal justice, and other areas. We focus in part on the reparations commission proposed by H.R. 40, the most comprehensive reparations legislation in US history. We also make recommendations for strengthening the research and policy-development infrastructure for reparations.We argue that in addition to compensation for past harms, conceptualizations of reparations should involve looking at present practices, policies, and barriers to economic security and wealth building for Black Americans. We can account for historical injustices and prioritize how they have contributed to and exacerbated present inequalities while considering how current policies continue to exacerbate and reproduce those inequalities.In addition to exploring early reparations efforts in the United States, we review selected policy proposals that have involved efforts to make progress on reparations for Black Americans, analyze the current reparations policy landscape, and recommend ways researchers can identify approaches to make reparations effective at eliminating key racial gaps for Black Americans. This research can inform policy discussions and analyses of reparations, especially as governments continue to explore them.

Harnessing the Power of Data: Inclusive Growth and Recovery Challenge Impact Report

March 23, 2023

With generous support from the Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth and The Rockefeller Foundation, data.org issued an open call in May 2020 for breakthrough ideas that harness the power of data to help people and communities rebound and remain resilient in the wake of COVID-19 and its economic impact.Through the Inclusive Growth and Recovery Challenge, data.org sought to address a systemic issue: the majority of social initiatives don't have the budget, staff, capacity, or partnerships to take full advantage of our current data revolution. But with support, mission-driven organizations can use data, tools, and methods to make their work go further and faster, helping more people.After thorough review, we awarded $10 million in funding and technical assistance across eight exemplary awardees from a pool of over 1,200 applications, and the Paul Ramsay Foundation funded a ninth project. These awardees show the range of opportunities that exist to use data to drive social impact for workers, entrepreneurs, and communities. 

“It’s Not For Us”: Understanding How Meta-Oppression Influences Black Americans’ Experiences with the Credit System

March 23, 2023

For many Black Americans the doors to critical wealth-building tools that easily open for their white counterparts are locked or obstructed because of centuries-long discriminatory policies and practices. Without these same opportunities, Black Americans are often left behind, perpetually playing against a stacked deck.Structural racism not only shapes the outcomes that people experience in all sectors of life, but it also has psychological effects on what Black Americans think is possible. This psychological stress from dealing with persistent structural racism across society is called meta-oppression, a concept developed by Dr. Jacqueline Scott.Through a study of Black Chicago residents' experiences with the credit system, we found that Black Americans internalized feelings of guilt, hopelessness, and despair, all of which hindered their willingness to further engage with the credit system. By illuminating the diverse effects of structural racism on the lives of Black Americans, we hope to reveal key opportunities for policy and practice to interrupt meta-oppression and advance racial equity across society.

How Structural Racism Shapes Black Americans’ Sense of Self: Understanding Meta-Oppression and Its Effects in the Credit System

March 23, 2023

For many Black Americans the doors to critical wealth-building tools that easily open for their white counterparts are locked or obstructed because of centuries-long discriminatory policies and practices. Without these same opportunities, Black Americans are often left behind, perpetually playing against a stacked deck.Structural racism not only shapes the outcomes that people experience in all sectors of life, but it also has psychological effects on what Black Americans think is possible. This psychological stress from dealing with persistent structural racism across society is called meta-oppression, a concept developed by Dr. Jacqueline Scott.Through a study of Black Chicago residents' experiences with the credit system, we found that Black Americans internalized feelings of guilt, hopelessness, and despair, all of which hindered their willingness to further engage with the credit system. By illuminating the diverse effects of structural racism on the lives of Black Americans, we hope to reveal key opportunities for policy and practice to interrupt meta-oppression and advance racial equity across society.

Community Engagement Strategies to Advance Justice Reform: Implementation Lessons from Buncombe County, North Carolina, Cook County, Illinois, and New Orleans

March 15, 2023

Communities across the nation are wrestling with how to identify and implement effective reforms that reduce structural inequities in the criminal legal system, promote community safety, and right-size operations of the criminal legal system to achieve more equitable outcomes and increased safety. Research suggests the most inspired and transformative solutions to such intractable problems come from collaborative partnerships between policymakers, criminal legal system leaders, and community members.However, many communities struggle with community engagement because of the strained relationships between the criminal legal system and communities that have historically been criminalized by that system or alienated by civic leaders. Fortunately, some communities have made marked progress. The MacArthur Foundation's Safety and Justice Challenge (SJC) initiative to reduce the use of jails prioritized authentic engagement with community members across its grantees to build trust, enhance problem solving, and promote mutual accountability for justice reform.This report, which is part of a series of case studies highlighting the work of the SJC initiative, examines the community engagement strategies developed and implemented by three SJC communities: Buncombe County, North Carolina; Cook County, Illinois; and New Orleans. This report documents how these sites navigated challenges and advanced tangible reform efforts, and it explores the perceived impacts of these strategies on the sites' efforts to engage community members, reduce local jail use, and implement system reforms that advance equity. We conclude with a discussion of common themes in the sites' experiences implementing those strategies and recommendations for other communities seeking to advance community engagement.Sites used a variety of community engagement strategies, such as conducting listening sessions, hiring people with lived experience of the criminal legal system to organize events, and using art to receive community feedback on public safety.Common challenges from the three participating sites include navigating long-standing mistrust between community members and government, recruitment and retention in community engagement workgroups, and shifting strategies because of COVID-19.Recommendations and lessons learned from the three sites include ensuring proper resources are available to support community engagement efforts; communicating expectations and the likely pace of progress with community members; considering the accessibility of meetings; elevating the voices of people of color directly impacted by the criminal legal system; providing benefits to community members who attend meetings; leveraging technology to engage the community; and ensuring a diverse group of people is engaged.

Sector Infrastructure Funding Analysis

March 8, 2023

Voluntary sector infrastructure bodies perform vital roles supporting and enabling voluntary and community organisations, both locally and at a national level. This report explores how the voluntary sector infrastructure has changed over the last 12 years, particularly by looking at its finances and funding. It highlights a number of challenges around funding of these organisations.It is our intention that this research provides context to grantmakers to inform strategy development and encourage funder collaboration. Infrastructure organisations are sometimes an invisible part of the sector, but we all feel the impact when organisations close, either directly or indirectly. The Paul Hamlyn Foundation has commissioned 360Giving to support this analysis as a starting point to facilitate discussions and support more active decision-making in what is likely to be a very challenging period for the sector.The data used in this report is available to explore. As noted in the report methodology in the appendix, identifying the full extent of organisations and detailed information about them, particularly those that had closed, was challenging. We've used data from the Charity Commission, regulators in Scotland and Northern Ireland and 360Giving publishers to identify and analyse these organisations. There are some gaps in the data, but we believe it gives an overview of voluntary sector infrastructure and how it has changed.

Montgomery Moving Forward: A Decade of Community Engagement and Action

March 6, 2023

Montgomery Moving Forward (MMF) was established in 2012 to address multifaceted community challenges in Montgomery County, Maryland, and increase opportunities for cross-sector community stakeholders to exchange ideas and collaborate. MMF's collective impact efforts rely heavily on a Leadership Group (LG) drawn from public and private sectors in the county to move its initiatives forward. The LG also engages with local policymakers to help create institutional change in more formal ways, as shown in its Calls to Action for workforce development and early childhood education. The LG created a logic model to build shared understanding of its work and goals, and as a tool for communicating with community stakeholders. MMF's Accountability Workgroup developed performance measures aligned with the logic model and tenets of collective impact. In 2022 the workgroup surveyed MMF leaders and community partners to better understand the strengths and gaps of its collective impact activities.

تقييم سريع للاحتياجات: الأثر المباشر لزلزال شباط 2023 ع�� الشر�ات السور�ة الصغ��ة والمتوسطة �� تركيا

March 2, 2023

ت��أقوى الزلازل ال�ي شهد��ا البلاد �� 1 �� 6 شباط2023 ، أدت سلسلة من الزلازل المدمرة �� جنوب تركيا إ�� مقتل أك�� من 000.50�خص �� تركياوسور�ا.المائة عام الماضية عدة هزات ارتدادية عنيفة. �� المقاطعات العشر المتضررة من الزلزال �� جنوب تركيا، ا��ار أك�� من 000,500 مب�ى، وأصبح أك�� من 5.1 مليون2 .ومن ب�ن المتضرر�ن ما يقرب من مليو�ي لا�� سوري �عيشون �� المناطق المتضررة والذين نزحواأساسا �سبب ا�حرب الأهلية المستمرة �� ً �خص بلا مأوى3 سور�كما وجد تالأ بحاث ةالسابق لـ Markets Building ،فقد جلبالسور�ون مهارا��م �� مجال ر�ادة الأعمال ورأس المال إ��تركيا ، حيث أسسوا أك�� من 2500 شركة صغ��ة ومتوسطةا�حجم (KOBİ (المتواجدة �� شبكتنا، وأك�� من 50 ٪م��ا تقع�� المناطق المتضررة من الزلزال جنوب تركيا ، بما �� ذلكمقاطعات أضنة وغازي عنتاب وهاتاي و مرس�ن وأورفھ. � ح�ن أن العديد من هذه الشر�ات الصغ��ة والمتوسطة قد تأثرت بلا شك بالزلزال، إلا أن هناك �عض الأسباب الرئيسية لل��ك�� ع�� �عاف��ا:1 .لتلبية الاحتياجات الفور�ة والعاجلة لأ�حاب الأعمال وموظف��م وعائلا��م ح�ى لا يقعوا �� حالة ضعف أو خطر أك�� .2 .لدعمهم �� إيصال الإغاثة المطلو�ة �شدة �� المناطق ال�ي دمرها الزلزال.3 . .لدعم استعادة سبل العيش لأ�حاب الأعمال وموظف��م.4 .لضمان �عا�� الأسواق ال�ي �عمل ف��ا هذه الشر�ات الفردية. ��دف هذا التقييم السريع للاحتياجات إ�� فهم تأث�� الزلزال ع�� الشر�ات الصغ��ة والمتوسطة ال�ي يملكها السور�ون ويعملون ��ا وعمليا��م التجار�ة واحتياجا��مالأك�� إ�حاحا. ستساعد هذه الدراسة منظمة Markets Building والمنظمات المعنية الأ خرى �� إعطاء الأولو�ة للدعم اللازم لأ�حاب الشر�ات الصغ��ة ًوالمتوسطة والموظف�ن وعائلا��م الف��ة ال�ي ت�� الزلزال مباشرة لمساعد��م ع�� استئناف العمليات التجار�ة ال�املة والمساهمة �� جهود الإغاثة.On February 6, 2023, a series of devastating earthquakes in southern Türkiye killed more than 50,00 people in the country and Syria.  The most powerful quakes in the country in the last 100 years have been followed by several violent aftershocks. In the ten earthquake-affected provinces in southern Türkiye, more than 500,000 buildings collapsed, and over 1.5 million people have been left homeless. Among those impacted are approximately two million Syrian refugees living in the affected areas and already previously displaced by the ongoing civil war in Syria.As Building Markets' previous research has found, Syrians have brought their entrepreneurial skills and capital to Türkiye, starting the more than 2,500 small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in our network, over 50% of which are located in earthquake-affected areas of southern Türkiye, including in the provinces of Adana, Gaziantep, Hatay, Mersin, and Sanliurfa.While many of these SMEs have no doubt been impacted by the earthquake, there are a few key reasons to focus on their recovery:To meet the immediate and urgent needs of business owners, their staff, and families so they do not fall into deeper vulnerability or risk.To support them in the delivery of much-needed relief in areas that have been devastated by the earthquake.To support livelihoods recovery for the business owners and their staff.To ensure the markets in which these individual businesses operate can recover.This rapid needs assessment aims to understand the earthquake's impact on Syrian-owned and employing SMEs, their business operations, and their most pressing needs. This study will help Building Markets and other stakeholders prioritize necessary support for SME owners, employees, and their families during the earthquake's immediate aftermath to help them resume full business operations and contribute to the relief effort.