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Choice Neighborhoods Promising Practice Guides & Webinars

Resident Voices in Neighborhood Revitalization

This guide tells the stories of two resident leaders who actively represent their neighbors, foster strong social networks and educate their peers as their communities are undergoing large-scale neighborhood revitalization. In their own voices, Uzuri Pease-Greene from San Francisco and Jocquelyn Marshall from New Orleans share insights into how they became leaders in their neighborhoods, how they have reached out to a diverse range of community members and how their voices have come to represent the priorities and perspectives of their neighbors. Their paths to leadership can serve as lessons for other community leaders and stakeholders seeking to identify, grow and support strong resident leadership in support of neighborhood change.

Choice Neighborhoods are Safe Neighborhoods: Tackling the Drivers of Crime in the South End of Springfield, MA

Jointly published by HUD, DOJ and LISC, this guide examines the work of the Choice Neighborhoods and Byrne Criminal Justice Innovation (BCJI) grantees in the South End of Springfield, MA, to transform a neighborhood long known as a center of dilapidated housing and dangerous streets into a place where people choose to live, work and raise their children. The Springfield story offers an example of how Choice Neighborhoods and BCJI grants can build on each other for better collective outcomes. The lessons learned at the end of the guide highlight crucial intersections between the two federal investments in communities.

“This is Our Community – We’re All In:” Civic Participation in Pittsburgh’s Larimer/East Liberty Choice Neighborhood 

This guide describes the development of an infrastructure for civic participation in Pittsburgh’s Larimer/East Liberty neighborhood. The Larimer Consensus Group (LCG), a grassroots group comprised of residents and other community stakeholders, emerged from a community-driven planning process in 2008. Since that time, the LCG has grown as a successful agent of change and an effective decision-making body with influence in the neighborhood. The LCG’s development as an influential stakeholder in neighborhood revitalization serves as a promising example for communities seeking to build civic participation that drives and sustains neighborhood gains.

Members of Pittsburgh’s Choice Neighborhoods team spoke at the April 2015 Choice Neighborhoods Planning Grantee convening. Carolyn Peeks and Donna Jackson, Chair and Treasurer, respectively, of the Larimer Consensus Group; Malik Bankston, Executive Director of the Kingsley Association; and Jessica Smith Perry, Assistant Director of Housing for the Urban Redevelopment Authority of Pittsburgh, shared lessons, challenges and advice from Pittsburgh’s long-term neighborhood planning process in Larimer/East Liberty. Facilitated by Frank Farrow, Director of the Center for the Study of Social Policy.

Designing & Directing Neighborhood Change Efforts: How to be More Intentional and Effective - Choice Neighborhoods Resource Guide by Michael Schubert

Written by Michael Schubert, Principal of Community Development Strategies, this guide is designed to help Choice Neighborhoods grantees, as well as others engaged in neighborhood change efforts, be more intentional and effective in their revitalization work. It provides a framework for both thought and action.  At the core of this guide is a simple yet profound idea: the importance of influencing individual investment decisions made by neighbors and by other stakeholders in ways that benefit the neighborhood.  Neighborhood conditions are driven to a large extent by the range of investment decisions neighbors and other stakeholders make about the neighborhood and how others interpret those decisions.  Organizations that intervene – whether they be public, private, or non-profit – often mistakenly believe that their decisions will drive the future of the neighborhood. In reality, however, the decisions of neighbors matter most.  Using this lens, the focus of the guide is on four areas: (1) building a positive neighborhood image; (2) stabilizing the housing market; (3) improving physical conditions; and (4) strengthening the social fabric in the neighborhood.

Download Worksheets from the Resource Guide:

  • Worksheet A. What is Working and Not Working
  • Worksheet B. Outcome & Measures
  • Worksheet C. Develop Five Key Strategies
  • Worksheet D. Enhancing the Impact of Your Strategies
  • Worksheet D. Example: This PDF provides an example of a completed Worksheet D: Enhancing the Impact of your Strategies 
  • Worksheet E. Identifying and Eliminating Obstacles to Successful Implementation

Choice Neighborhoods: Placing School Improvements and Student Achievement at the Center of Neighborhood Revitalization in Seattle’s Yesler Neighborhood

This guide highlights how the Seattle Choice Neighborhoods grant team prioritized educational improvements in the Yesler neighborhood by collaborating with multiple partners, including Seattle University, the school district andchild-centered nonprofit organizations.  As a result of their collaborative efforts, positive outcomes are emerging for students in a local elementary school. Seattle’s experience serves as a promising practice for other communities looking to use school improvement and student achievement as a cornerstone of creating desirable neighborhoods.

Creating Choice Neighborhoods: Boston's Critical Community Improvements

This guide highlights the process that the Boston Choice Neighborhoods grant team used to determine the neighborhood improvement projects to fund with Choice Neighborhoods Critical Community Improvements dollars. The projects – a commercial food production facility, retail façade improvements, facilities improvements for local nonprofits, community wi-fi, and playgrounds –reveal the potential and flexibility of these funds. Boston’s story serves as a promising practice for communities seeking to prioritize strategic neighborhood improvements.