Citizens Bank Donates to LISC
The Citizens Bank Foundation has donated $40,000 to the Philadelphia Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) to support its Sustainable Communities Initiative in West Philadelphia and Eastern North Philadelphia. The grant will help launch Financial Opportunity Centers in the target neighborhoods which will provide families with employment, financial education, and benefits access. It will also promote green development.
Pictured from left are Dan Fitzpatrick, Chairman and CEO of Citizens Bank of PA, NJ and DE, Bill Smith, Senior Vice President of Community Investments at Citizens Bank and Andy Frishkoff, Executive Director of LISC.
LISC applauds the State Farm® commitment to build healthier communities
NEW YORK (February 21, 2012) /PRNewswire/ — A State Farm $4 million grant for 2012-2013 will fund Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) programs and projects in nine communities, focusing on local business development, jobs, education and safety.
“State Farm is helping drive significant, lasting, quality-of-life changes for people and places that would otherwise be struggling to find options,” said Michael Rubinger, President and CEO of LISC. “In this economic climate, that help is invaluable.”
The two-year grant from State Farm will fund programs and projects in Chicago, Houston, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Minneapolis/St. Paul, New York City, Philadelphia, Phoenix and the San Francisco Bay Area.
“Thousands of families all across the country face very real economic challenges,” said Mary Crego, Senior Vice President at State Farm. “It is why we remain committed to this work which helps to build safer, stronger and better educated neighborhoods.”
The new State Farm grant will support a wide range of programs, including:
- development of Financial Opportunity Centers in Houston and Minneapolis, which help low-income families stabilize their financial circumstances and build assets,
- commercial revitalization programs in Phoenix, Indianapolis, and the San Francisco Bay area designed to attract new businesses to disinvested areas and create jobs,
- support for a Chicago summer basketball league that brings families and police together to reclaim gang-ridden streets,
- assistance for an arts entrepreneurship program in Minneapolis for youth and emerging adult artists,
- development of new community gardens and urban agriculture projects in partnership with neighborhood residents in Milwaukee,
- workforce development programs in Philadelphia that combines on-the-job training with a community college education to offer medical field career paths, and
- green initiatives in New York City that ensure families can take advantage of the lower energy costs and improved air quality that comes from green retrofits.
In fact, these kinds of core local issues are all interrelated, Rubinger said. “You can’t disconnect one from the other—they all underpin safe, strong, healthy neighborhoods where families can thrive, businesses can grow, and kids can learn and play. Stronger communities create opportunity. They bolster regional economies and support our broader national economic recovery. State Farm is helping drive and sustain that work.”
About LISC
LISC combines corporate, government and philanthropic resources to help nonprofit community development corporations revitalize distressed neighborhoods. Since 1980, LISC has raised $11.1 billion to build or rehab 277,000 affordable homes and develop 44 million square feet of retail, community and educational space nationwide. LISC support has leveraged nearly $33.9 billion in total development activity. For more information, visit www.lisc.org.
About State Farm®:
State Farm and its affiliates are the largest provider of car insurance in the U.S. and is a leading insurer in Canada. In addition to providing auto insurance quotes, their 17,800 agents and more than 65,000 employees serve 81 million policies and accounts – more than 79 million auto, home, life and health policies in the United States and Canada, and nearly 2 million bank accounts. Commercial auto insurance, along with coverage for renters, business owners, boats and motorcycles, is also available. State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company is the parent of the State Farm family of companies. State Farm is ranked No. 37 on the Fortune 500 list of largest companies. For more information, please visit http://www.statefarm.com or in Canada http://www.statefarm.ca.
The Mt Vernon Manor Board of Directors and the We Are Mantua Choice Neighborhoods Planning leadership team is seeking a Youth Leadership Intern to help organize the participation of young adults in the Choice Neighborhoods Planning process. The Youth Leadership Intern will be a member of the Choice Neighborhoods Steering Committee and will lead a Mantua Youth Task Force, made up of Mantua young adults, that will produce a report summarizing proposals for the future of Mantua. The Youth Intern will receive a stipend of $2,000 for work conducted during the period February 20 – June 31. Funds for the Youth Leadership Intern are made possible by a grant from Drexel University.
The internship is open to Mantua residents, ages 16-24.
See the attached announcement for more information: YouthInternAnnouncementMantua
Leadership Development in Eastern North Philadelphia
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Last week LISC and Asociación Puertorriqueños en Marcha (APM) held the first meeting of their Leadership Academy for Eastern North Philadelphia residents. The two nonprofits are partnering to provide leadership training to a variety of community members, ranging in age from youth to older adults. The training sessions will empower residents to take leadership roles in our Sustainable Communities Initiative, and foster multigenerational leadership in the neighborhood.
Through the various training sessions, participants will learn how to engage members of the community, build networks, coordinate volunteers, solve problems, manage conflict, and other helpful skills for neighborhood leadership. These sessions will also provide residents with basic skills on video production and campaign development.
Crime and Safety–A priority for Philadelphia communities
POP Conference
Attending the Problem Oriented Policing Conference (POP) is not the first thing I thought about when signing on as a program officer for a community development intermediary. Working on resolving crime and safety issues in the neighborhoods where we are building a better quality of life, is however, of utmost importance to changing the landscape of most communities that lie on the border of distress and revitalization. Often community development is seen as bricks and mortar development, leaving one to the assumption that “If you build it, they will come,” and that is the end of the story. In today’s world of community development, addressing all quality of life issues in neighborhood redevelopment are crucial to the neighborhood’s long lasting success and improved quality of life. Thus, integrating community safety initiatives as a priority for Philadelphia neighborhoods is a must.
The LISC National Crime and Safety Initiativeworks to address safety issues in Sustainable Communities all across the country. As a part of the work police departments: Chiefs of Police, captains, lieutenants, and their officers are all working toward engaging communities in a proactive way to prevent crime rather than simply enforcing the law. The POP Conference is a place for police officers and community stakeholders to embrace problem oriented policing together, teaching analysis techniques like SARA (scanning, analysis, response, and assessment), CPTED (Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design), and Safegrowth (Stage 2 of CPTED). All of these tactics are aimed at engaging community stakeholders including residents in addressing both crime problems that are seemingly institutional to neighborhoods, but also crime problems that present themselves as emerging crises that places in transition sometimes experience, like break ins as new homes emerge.
The newly re-opened Rainbow de Colores Park
In 2010, Philadelphia LISC successfully engaged community organizations through our Sustainable Communities’ lead agencies facilitating CPTED and Safegrowth trainings. In each neighborhood the trainings provided hands on tools to redevelop very specific crime hot spots into safer places to live and play. In eastern North a park was reborn and police officers are receiving bikes to respond to crime in a quicker manner and to engage community residents in a more approachable mode of transportation. In West residents traveling to and from work on the El have are now seeing the light. A lighting strategy designed to allow people to feel safer is currently in the works.
The El station at 46th and Market in West Philadelphia will receive a lighting facelift.
The POP conference highlighted the wildly successful approaches to tackling difficult crime problems. Most importantly, the POP conference served as a platform for individuals from the safety community, government and the non profit world, to come together to discuss ways to successfully integrate partnerships. Moving forward in Philadelphia there will be multiple opportunities to employ these strategies. In eastern North Philadelphia, where a year long planning process commenced this summer, the neighborhood is ripe for a new set of problem-oriented trainings. Those trainings too, will be directly linked to tangible projects for residents and organizations to tackle. The ultimate goals of course being to reduce crime, engage the community, and improve the quality of life for all of us who live, work, and play in vibrant and dynamic neighborhoods like eastern North andWest Philadelphia.
By Sarah Sturtevant
Affordable, Green Homes–Sheridan Street Dedication
Although it was a rainy, cloudy Wednesday afternoon, numerous city officials, non-profit leaders, community residents, and local stakeholders packed under a tent on Sheridan Street in Eastern North Philadelphia for the dedication of Sheridan Street homes.
Formerly vacant land, Sheridan Street is a green, affordable housing development with 13 environmentally friendly homes. The development was made possible through a partnership between Asociacion Puertorriquenos en Marcha (APM) and Interface Studio Architects, along with LISC and other collaborators.
The homes boast solar hot water panels, green roofs, rain barrels, recycled building materials, and strategically positioned windows to improve interior climate control. Because of these green features, Sheridan Street is LEED Gold certified—the second highest level for measuring sustainability. 
In an effort to make Philadelphia one of the greenest cities in America, Philadelphia Mayor Nutter commented that “people think solar panels and energy efficiency are things that other people do, but this is not a fad—this is a movement and this is real. It’s about the future, jobs and economic opportunity.”
President and CEO of APM, Nilda Ruiz echoed the Mayor’s green initiative. “APM continues to look for ways to make things green, particularly through affordable housing.” APM’s multi-phase affordable housing development Pradera homes is also in the neighborhood, along with a Transit-Oriented Development project at Temple University and the new Rainbow de Colores Playground.
For more information on Sheridan Street homes, click here.
SCI Eastern North Implementation Meetings are Underway!
Continuing the momentum from SCI-Eastern North’s Rollout in June, this Tuesday evening marked the beginning of implementation committee meetings. Focusing on income and wealth, healthy lifestyles, and children, youth and education, community organizations, stakeholders, and residents came together to discuss community projects to implement in the near future. The healthy lifestyles committee discussed nutrition workshops and drug and alcohol prevention classes. Several projects are underway for youth in the area, including the Digital Connectors program, where youth receive technology training and leadership skills. The income and wealth group focused on assessing quality of life plan goals and assessing current programs meeting those goals. Additionally, they discussed the implementation of possible future projects including the eastern North Financial Opportunity Center.
This is just the beginning of the implementation process, so there are several more meetings to join in and talk about what you want to do in the community. The leadership committee and Income and Wealth committee will be meeting next on October 18. Arts and culture, physical environment, and economic development are meeting on November 1. All committees will be meeting at the Welsh School (2331 North 4th Street) from 5-7pm.
Philadelphia Youth Lead the Change for Healthier Food in Public Schools
Students from the PUFFA (Philadelphia Urban Food and Fitness Alliance) and SALT (Students Advocating for Lifestyle Transformations) came together Thursday night for their monthly meeting, held at the People’s Emergency Center. These groups advocate for including healthy, local alternatives to school lunches as well as in their communities. During the past year, they participated in conferences, went before the school commission, participated in summer internships focused on food access, and collected signature for petitions—all for healthier school food. As their first meeting of the school year, they chatted over a meal of turkey-burgers and salad (prepared by the students) about upcomin
g events.
POWER Convention Calls for Collective Effort to Rebuild Philadelphia
A crowd of about 2,000 supporters gathered Sunday, September 25th at the Tindley Temple on South Broad Street for the founding convention of POWER (Philadelphians Organized to Witness, Empower, and Rebuild).
With about 40 congregations across the Philadelphia area and 25,000 members, POWER pledged to connect thousands of Philadelphians to living wage jobs over the next several years. Other issues POWER will address are education, housing, health care and public safety.
POWER called on the city, organizations and individuals to help in their plan to rebuild Philadelphia. Several city officials were in attendance, including Mayor Nutter and City 
Council member Bill Green. Mayor Nutter said that he wants to see “not that someone has a job, but a career.” He said that he “looks forward to helping thousands of Philadelphians knock down the barriers to find jobs.” Green is committed to working on legislation that will increase local-hiring in public projects.
Bishop Dwayne Royster of Living Water United Church of Christ was introduced as POWER’s executive director.
Check out more about POWER at Philly.com.
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On August 20, the opening ceremony was held for the Rainbow de Colores Playground in Eastern North Philadelphia. In attendance were Andy Frishkoff (LISC), Nilda Ruiz (APM), Police Captain Cram, and City Councilwoman Maria Quinones-Sanchez, who all spoke about the importance of the park in the community.
The day full of fun included food, games, face-painting, rock climbing, and music. In addition to providing delicious food for everyone, the 26th Police District officers sat in a dunk tank and let kids try to dunk them. Also, the new handball court’s grand opening began with a handball tournament. Gearing up for school, a local church provided free school supplies to neighborhood families. Check out more pictures here!
