LISC Special Report: Financial Opportunity Centers offer comprehensive approach for long-term financial health
Date Published: 09/28/2010
Author: LISC
This special report highlights LISC's Financial Opportunity Center model which provides services focused on employment placement and career improvement, financial education and coaching, and public benefits access. There are 32 existing Centers in nine cities.
Excerpt:
The recent economic downturn has had an impact on Americans of nearly every economic stratum. But its scope has been particularly devastating for low- and moderate-income families without the job mobility that comes with high-demand skills or the backstop that savings and investments might offer. Their communities show the strain. Plummeting property values and rising crime surround them. Overcrowding and staff cuts constrain their local schools. Local merchants are failing. And many of the social services and recreational programs on which they have long relied have been curtailed or eliminated. Their families and their communities were already facing challenges. Now, many are in significant distress.
That’s, in part, why a focus on building the income and assets of low- and moderate-income families is such an important part of LISC’s Building Sustainable Communities initiative. It’s clear that communities marked by the unabated poverty of their residents cannot flourish, no matter how much we invest in the surrounding environment. Affordable housing, quality schools, safe streets and thriving commercial corridors are critical. But struggling families also need creative tools to help them stabilize their financial circumstances. They need confidence that they can achieve a better quality of life. They need a plan for the future, and help to achieve it. Their economic stability is just as critical to the health of their communities as is eliminating physical blight. Continued[+]..
> Download the full report (PDF, 2.32 MB)
Topics: Economic Development & Safety, --Community Development
Type: Case study / model practice, Topical report