Crenshaw Corridor

The Crenshaw Corridor is a community rich in African-American culture in Los Angeles, and where the city’s highest concentration of African-Americans of all income levels reside.  The preservation of the area’s culture is a highly important goal for the residents, merchants and artists who work and live in this area – as well as for many others throughout the greater Los Angeles community.  A uniquely mixed-income community serves as both an attribute of the community and vulnerability, however, at the same time it is important to address the growing schism between the “haves” and “have nots” and that the fragileness of the economic structure, does not turn in away that neither keeps lower income households isolated and not achieving upward mobility nor causes higher income households to abandon the area if adequate and quality goods and services are unavailable.  

While significant pockets of the community boast some of the city’s highest income census tracts, the overall median income is $36,486 compared to the county-wide of $59,800, and the poverty rate is 28%.  Since the 1992 Civil Unrest, a very modest amount of development has occurred in the area, but it is still plagued with concerns about youth, education and employment. 

The Crenshaw Corridor is one of Los Angeles LISC’s targeted Sustainable Community areas.  To-date, LISC has invested $11 million on a range of projects and programs from affordable housing developments to charter schools to a commercial corridor initiative.

Community Build, Inc. 

Community Build, Inc. is a private non-profit 501 (c) (3) community development corporation established in July 1992 in response to the April 1992, Los Angeles Civil Unrest.  Organized with the assistance and support of Congresswoman Maxine Waters, Community Build is an effort by African American organizations and individuals to address and change the conditions that led to the Civil Unrest.  Community Build’s founding organizations include: Black Women’s Forum, Inc., Broadway Federal Bank, Brotherhood Crusade, Family Savings Bank, Founders National Bank, 100 Black Men of Los Angeles, and the Watts Health Foundation.

Community Build’s mission reads as follows:  “We are dedicated to the revitalization of our community through human investment and commercial economic development.  We strive to empower our communities and the young people of today by investing, training and equipping them with the skills, resources, confidence and encouragement they need to become active participants in the process of rebuilding our community.”

The CDC’s programs focus on human capital development and commercial development.

Community Build believes that by empowering capable individuals with information and practical knowledge, neighborhoods can awaken a strong sense of “community” in area residents, and that this process creates stronger citizens and even stronger communities, individual by individual, and block by block.

Community Build is focused on providing services to youth and families in the Vermont-Manchester area of Los Angeles, and on assisting the preservation and economic revitalization of the commercial core of Leimert Park Village, in cooperation with the Leimert Park Village Merchants’ Association and other area stakeholders.

Community Build, also serves as lead agency for Los Angeles LISC Sustainable Communities Initiative in the Crenshaw Corridor, which is a community-driven process to improve the Quality-of-Life over 5 years.

http://www.communitybuild.org

www.sustainablecommunitiescrenshaw.org