May 2012 | Volume 1, Issue 1  

 IN THIS ISSUE:

 President Obama Announces White House Council on SC2
 Memphis: Create, Grow, Invest, Advance By Sarah Ray, Team Lead
 SC2 Community Solutions Teams

 

SC2 Community Solutions Teams

The six pilot SC2 Community Solutions Teams are partnering with their respective cities to advance a broad set of initiatives. The following represents a sample of the Teams’ recent projects.

Chester

  • The SC2 team is developing relationships with local organizations such as The Reinvestment Fund, The Food Trust, Philabundance, and others with resources and capacity to advance food access issues in the City. Because of this work, the City of Chester will soon be able to provide needy residents with low-cost, nutritious food in a supermarket-style store.
  • The SC2 team is establishing the Healthy Chester Coalition with a key health care insurer, local anchor institutions, community health care providers, and other stakeholders to help Chester meet its health care goals.
  • The GSA SC2 team member assisted the City in obtaining a 30-foot boat for policing the Chester waterfront through the Excess Personal Property Program.

Cleveland

  • SC2 resolved a long-running deed restriction issue that had endangered a local redevelopment housing project. The 79-unit senior housing project uses tax credits, Neighborhood Stabilization Program 2 Competitive and Direct grants, and housing authority reinvestment funds. SC2 leadership worked with HUD to reach an agreement that keeps project funding intact and construction on schedule.
  • Through the work of SC2, the Cleveland/Cuyahoga County Workforce Investment Board created a workgroup focused on new methods to engage the community in aligning workforce resources to better connect employers to the unemployed, veterans, and youth entering the workforce. DOL, Education, and EDA are engaged, as well as Living Cities, where workforce is the focus for 2012.
  • SC2 worked to ensure the extension of federal Lead-Based Paint Hazard Control grants that were set to expire. These grants allow the city to continue to provide services to families with children to protect them from the dangers of lead-based paint.
  • Building on the success and growth of the City’s transit system, the SC2 DOT member has worked to provide greater assistance in understanding the TIGER grant process over each round. As a result, in the third round of the program, the Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority received a TIGER award in the amount of $12,500,000 for the relocation and enhancement of the City’s Mayfield Road Rapid transit station.

Detroit

  • Promoting small businesses by hosting a HubZone boot camp for businesses in HubZone-designated areas to help increase the number of qualified businesses in these zones.
  • Enhancing workforce development by bringing together InfoSys and Wayne County Community College to launch an intense 17-week Software Engineering Boot Camp to train a workforce for the nearly 3,000 IT job openings in and around Detroit.
  • Creating pathways toeEmployment by establishing a “Right Skills Now” Precision Manufacturing Initiative at Wayne County Community College based on a certification program endorsed by the National Association of Manufacturers. The fast-track career program will train local residents in precision manufacturing technologies to meet the urgent demand for skilled talent in southeast Michigan.
  • Addressing barriers to critical infrastructure needs by collaborating and focusing assets to ensure that the M-1 Rail Streetcar and Bus Rapid Transit projects remain on schedule.

Memphis

  • SC2 advised the Mayor in crafting priorities and a vision for his new term, informed by the team’s inventory of more than 40 strategic plans underway in the City. The team is helping create and implement a CityStat system of performance management, where data is used to drive decisions.
  • SC2 team members are working with the City Engineer, the bus system, and the Metropolitan Planning Organization to analyze transportation plans and recommend ways to increase transit access to better connect workers to job and neighborhoods to centers of activity. One such recommendation is for the MPO to map projects by city council district, which the team is in the process of completing.
  • GSA had more than 20 computers available to donate, and the SC2 team helped identify a strategic use for the computers. The Tennessee Achievement School District had just announced three middle schools in North Memphis that would be turnaround schools – receiving new leadership and a renewed focus from community organizations to work with the schools – so the team connected school leadership to GSA, and students will now have greater technology access.

New Orleans

  • The SC2 team has partnered with the city and a local small business support organization to start the Government Entrepreneur in Residence (EIR) program, which is a new initiative that allows startups, on a regular basis, to access information and expertise on a variety of federal programs that support new businesses. A collaboration between the Economic Development Administration, The Idea Village and the City of New Orleans, the EIR hosts monthly “office hours” where businesses can get one-on-one support from federal officials.
  • As part of the City's overall effort to improve behavioral health care in New Orleans, the City and federal SC2 staff have created a Behavioral Health Resource Guide. This document is a comprehensive listing of substance abuse and mental health care providers and services that allows residents to easily identify and subsequently access necessary care and services for mental health and substance abuse conditions. The Guide will help provide a path to care for countless individuals who currently do not know where to go to find help.
  • The SC2 team has worked with the city to establish the Mayor’s Strategic Command to Reduce Murders, which is a comprehensive public health and law enforcement framework that is based on the Milwaukee Homicide Review Commission model. Established in partnership with DOJ, the Strategic Command utilizes a multi-disciplinary, data-driven, evidence-based approach to generate recommendations for tactical and longer-term change needs; these adaptations include policy and service delivery changes that will decrease the likelihood of future homicides.

Fresno

  • The SC2 team convened over 30 stakeholders and provided intensive technical assistance to maximize high speed rail planning in Fresno and leverage existing resources. The SC2 team has organized, facilitated, and coordinated multiple concurrent Fresno planning efforts that will effect, and be affected by, high speed rail planning.
  • The SC2 team coordinated with the City and other partners to place six Americorps VISTA and Americorps VIP members for a full-time year of service, as well as an 8-member Americorps National Civilian Community Corps Team to support SC2 related priorities.
  • On April 25, Mayor Ashley Swearengin and SBA District Director Carlos Mendoza kicked off the current class of the SBA "e200" initiative designed to help increase growth opportunities for Fresno small businesses. SC2 team members collaborated with the City and several local business and economic development organizations to target Fresno business recruitment for the 2012 e200 class. After a competitive selection process, 17 local small business owners will now participate in this highly acclaimed executive-level MBA-style development and training course.
  • The SC2 team is working closely with the City to advance its first Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) line. More than $37 million of FTA program funding is now committed to the project. Early engagement by the SC2 team helped in the planning of the best route for the BRT line.

 


 

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