The Community Development Innovation Forum
Initiated by Boston LISC and the Massachusetts Association of Community Development Corporations (MACDC) in 2008, the Community Development Innovation Forum ("the Forum") aims to work towards the following objectives:
- Articulate the changing nature of community development work and develop a vision of future practice for the field.
- Identify the key opportunities for innovation in the field.
- Organize projects that develop new practices, products, capacities and systems to address today’s social justice and community development challenges.
The Forum has just released its Phase I Report. Download it here.
Community Development Forum Statement of Purpose:
The Community Development Innovation Forum is a process sponsored by MACDC and Boston LISC to engage a robust and thoughtful process to identify specific opportunities to advance innovative practices that will enable the field to most effectively respond to these changing dynamics. The Forum intentionally includes all stakeholders in the field - CDCs, funders, lenders, policy makers, consultants, academics, and other partners - to ensure that our thinking is reflective of the entire field and our solutions have broad support. Specifically, the goals of this effort are two-fold:
1. To be a forum for innovative thinking about the future of the community development field in the State of Massachusetts.
2. To generate practical ideas and strategies that the field can implement to increase its effectiveness and be more responsive to changing community conditions.
Sponsorship & Support
The Community Development Innovation Forum has received generous support from The Boston Foundation, The Hyams Foundation, and the Massachusetts Housing Partnership.
Getting the Forum Started!
On Wednesday June 11th, more than 70 people gathered at the headquarters of Boston Private Bank to consider the future of the community development field in Massachusetts. The first public event of the Community Development Innovation Forum co-sponsored by Boston LISC and the Massachusetts Association of Community Development Corporations (MACDC) drew community development corporation staff and board members, lenders, funders, public agency staff, and academic researchers for a three hour discussion of the central questions facing community developers in 2008.
Chicago CDC Executive Director Jim Capraro gave a keynote speech that described the challenges of comprehensive community building and how community developers in Chicago under the leadership of Chicago LISC started to reexamine their work and the future of Chicago’s neighborhoods in the mid 1990s.
Following Mr. Capraro, community development consultant John Cleveland of the Innovation Network for Communities presented an overview of the Forum organizing committee’s preliminary thinking and the central questions steering the forum’s focus. Participants broke into five working groups to initiate discussion around the issues. The five groups include:
Working Groups:
1. Chapter 40F / Field Definition
2. Real Estate Finance
3. Comprehensive Community Building
4. Collaborative Structures
5. Regional Equity Strategies
Download a summary of working group research initiatives
On Monday, September 29, 2008 more than 60 community development practitioners and supporters gathered at The Boston Foundation to reconvene the Community Development Innovation Forum's five working groups for the Interim Report Meeting. Facilitator John Cleveland presented a summary of the work done by the five working groups, and working group chairs led lively discussions that challenged participants to think about what the community development field will look like in ten years in Boston.
The 4th Biennial Convention of the MACDC held on November 15 was an opportunity for the Forum leaders to emphasize the movement towards comprehensive community development strategies. At the convention, more than 600 CDC board members, staff, and supporters gathered to learn and share amongst each other through sessions and workshops.
Again on January 14, 2009, the Forum convened more than 60 community development practitioners from Massachusetts CDCs, public agencies and intermediaries who were engaged by two nationally known community development experts. They presented models for developing effective strategies to impact neighborhood real estate markets in a time of volatility. Bob Weissbourd, a Chicago based consultant, the former Vice President of Shorebank and a member of the Obama housing transition team presented his model called "Dynamic Neighborhood Taxonomy" in the morning. Allan Mallach of Rutgers University, the National Housing Institute and the Brookings Institution presented his model called "Managing Neighborhood Change" in the afternoon.
Meetings continue between the working groups and various forum committees. For more information, please contact Marilyn Sanchez at msanchez@lisc.org.
Resources
Download all the past innovation forum materials and presentations here:
Boston Community Development Innovation Forum Structure Guide
Community Development Innovation Forum Kick Off Presentation
Comprehensive Development Presentation by James Capraro
Working Group Research Initiatives
Dynamic Neighborhood Taxonomy (Download: Part 1 & Part 2) by Bob Weissbourd
"Managing Neighborhood Change" by Allan Mallach
Download the Working Group Interim Reports
Get more information on LISC"s Sustainable Communities Initiatives