Power Station

Maryland Legal Aid is a lifeline for low-income people facing eviction, living with substandard housing conditions, seeking veteran's benefits and overcoming domestic abuse. MLAB, under the leadership of bridge-builder and advocate Wilhelm Joseph, is a robust nonprofit organization with 12 offices across the state. The newest program innovation, The Community Lawyering Initiative, is a mobile reso...

Alejandra Castillo has been a Special Advisor in the Clinton administration and National Director of the Department of Commerce Minority Business Development Agency under President Obama. Even so, she says that being CEO of the YWCA National is the hardest job she's ever had. Now celebrating its 160th year, the YWCA, this nation's first fully integrated institution has an explicit mission to elimi...

Washington, DC is not only our nation's capital, it is a city of neighborhoods, rich in African American arts and culture. In this episode of Power Station, Fair Budget co-director Monica Kamen, explains how shifting  demographics and significant public and private investment in affluent communities, have made citizen engagement in policy and budgetary decisions all the more critical. Monica and c...

Isabel Rubio, executive director of Hispanic Interest Coalition of Alabama, which serves the Latino immigrant community, explains the push and pull between progressiveness and regressiveness in Birmingham. In 2011, the passage of HB 56, allowed law enforcement to detain and arrest people for "reasonable suspicion" of unlawful status, creating profound fear in the community. More recently, the Lati...

For Evelyn Brito, access to healthy food is more than an abstract policy goal. It is a driving motivation for her new web-based series, My Bodega Makeover, which documents her collaboration with bodega owners and customers in her own neighborhood of Lynn, Massachusetts. The goals are ambitious. She is confident that bodegas can be a source of healthy foods if struggling owners can access produce,...

An important sea-change is underway in the housing and community development field. Opportunity Starts at Home, a new campaign launched by the National Low Income Housing Coalition, has drawn our nation's leading civil rights, education, economic mobility, housing, homelessness and health nonprofits into a multi-sector effort to support the expansion of rental housing for lowest income Americans....

Amelia Lobo is an all-in advocate for women and immigrants who aspire to be small business owners. She has underwritten loans to new small business owners in NYC and trained Latinas in Iowa in how to open and expand a business. She has grappled with the limitations of the federal Small Business Administration and wants nonprofits to advocate for systems changes to better serve their communities. A...

Kris Siglin believes deeply in the members of Housing Partnership Network. This collaboration of 100 high-performing housing developers of single and multi-family housing extends to 50 states. As Senior VP of Policy at HPN, Kris engages members in advocating for public resources to increase the scale of affordable housing solutions for low-income Americans. As a trade association, HPN values both...

As Sarah Mickelson explains, the National Low Income Housing Coalition views it members, low-income people living in federally assisted housing, as experts on our nation's severe housing shortage. They are included in every organizational conference and convening and meet regularly with members of Congress  about their experiences and recommendations. NLIHC is a relentless champion of the housing...

Luis Granados, executive director of Mission Economic Development Agency, believes in and uses the power of organizing, services, policy advocacy and capital to strengthen the foothold and economic futures of Latino families in San Francisco's Mission District. MEDA's new 501c4 initiative adds political engagement to the mix, elevating MEDA's role in determining representation of the community. Lu...

Before Seema became executive director of National Coalition for Asian Pacific American Community Development (CAPACD), she led Chhaya CDC, an influential nonprofit representing South Asians in Queens, New York. That experience informs her work with National CAPACD, whose 100 member organizations provide housing, youth, and small business services for East Asians and South Asians across the nation...

Access to affordable housing is a national imperative but, as Frank Woodruff will tell you, it takes more than bricks and mortar to build a community. Frank leads National Alliance of Community Economic Development Associations (NACEDA) an organization whose members are local and state level nonprofits serving CDCs (Community Development Corporations) in their communities. NACEDA's members have th...

Paty Funegra drew on her experience as an immigrant and a businesswoman to create a new model for generating economic and social change. The result, La Cocina VA, is a nonprofit, rooted in social entrepreneurship where women improve their English, sharpen their culinary skills, connect to employers and in some cases become business owners. La Cocina's bi-lingual culinary training program produces...

As Isaac Bowers of Equal Justice Works explains, early exposure to public interest work can change the trajectory of a law student's career. That is why EJW partners with law schools, law firms and foundations to engage and mobilize the next generation of public interest lawyers. These lawyers are making a life changing difference for homeless veterans, immigrants facing deportation and families f...

Gustavo Torres, executive director of CASA For All, and a national leader on immigrants' rights, is remarkably optimistic. His organization not only serves, through legal services, financial education and language classes, it deeply engages day laborers and domestic workers who are vulnerable to abuse, deportation and financial exploitation. Rather than seeing themselves as victims, they become in...

What happens when a financial adviser for high-wealth individuals takes his talents to a new platform: building wealth and assets for low-income and communities of color? Joseph Leitmann-Santa Cruz tells the story of his transition to Capital Area Asset Builders, the power of the Earned Income Tax Credit campaign to create a more equitable financial future, and how CAAB staff engage DC residents i...

As Dedrick tells us, the nation's racial wealth divide is a legacy of centuries of public policies enacted to favor White Americans and bar Black Americans from economic prosperity. That historical context and the impacts of the Financial Crisis of 2007-2009, have generated entire communities of low-wealth. Research by Dedrick and other scholars confirms that recognizes that income alone is not en...

Marla has mastered community engagement and policy advocacy in Latino communities. It starts with providing families with the highest level of support for starting businesses, buying homes, challenging and winning repairs to unsound rental housing conditions. LEDC's success, she says, is a result of a committed staff, who "change people's lives." As a result, elected officials  look to LEDC to inf...

In the opening episode of Power Station, community development innovator Ron Hantz talks about changing up old paradigms and, as he explains it, elevating the vibrational levels in communities. Ron is an expert in financing and developing housing in disinvested communities of color. He believes that nonprofits must engage communities at all levels of development, including being at the table with...