| Partnership for Regional Livability |
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Center for Regional and Neighborhood Action
2300 15th Street, Denver, CO 80202 *********** (303) 477-9985; (303) 477-9986 fax
M E M O
From: Scott Bernstein
To: Katherine Archuleta, John Parr
Date: May 20, 1999
Re: Potential Federal Tools to Aid in a Denver Regional Initiative
Summary
As currently planned, the meeting in California June 28 and 29 should culminate in a commitment to "try on" the idea of a local-federal partnership in each participating region: Denver, Atlanta, Bay Area, and Chicago. It is expected that in each region, a small number of specific opportunities will be identified. Each of these opportunities will have the following characteristics: they are regional in scope, link across central city, central county and suburban interests, stimulate public - private partnerships, use public authority to buttress private investments, link across multi-issue interests, and involve the region's interests inclusively. These should clearly be value-added in nature: new kinds of investment opportunities, linkages between communities and markets, and aggregation of heretofore-disparate demands and resources, should all result from the potential initiatives to be identified.
In this context, this memorandum presents a sample set of opportunities to help illustrate potential federal assistance tools.
As we understand your efforts to date, the planning team for a Denver initiative as part of the Partnership for Regional Livability has chosen to focus its efforts in two clustered areas. The first of these is Workforce and Human Services, and the second is around Land Conservation and Natural Resources.
The memo addresses the first opportunity. Our working assumption continues to be that the most viable approach is one that makes the most of existing federal resources and authority first, in the context of a process that is inherently local in character. The three kinds of resources highlighted for each opportunity are (1) information and planning; (2) investment and innovative finance; and (3) regulatory innovations.
Workforce and Human Services
We assume that the challenges to be addressed include:
Ø Concentrated poverty, asset deficiencies, and moving people from welfare to work
Ø The spatial mismatches between workforce and job locations, respectively
Ø The special burden that environmental conditions may impose on poorer communities and households
Ø Standing for disadvantaged persons and communities within existing governmental councils and institutions
Ø Coordination between different levels of government
Ø The challenge of working within a time of economic growth-the marketplace does not conform to formal geographic boundaries
Ø The need to work across city, suburban and rural communities within the region
In addressing the federal interest, it is important to focus on the nature of a partnership that can work for Denver. There is not existing authority to easily assemble multi-agency or inter-agency resource teams unless a clear direction and request from a local area can help align these interests. An additional caveat is that we make no assumptions about the capacity of the federal offices in and around Denver.
Ideas and opportunities that have been discussed to address this set of challenges include:
1. Concentrated poverty, asset deficiencies, and moving people from welfare to work
Ø Development of a region-wide workforce intermediary, similar to that underway with the Denver Workforce Initiative, across the entire geographic area. Federal roles: use of waiver and plan approval authority to stimulate necessary state-metro-county cooperation; planning assistance to identify economic clusters and sectors with high-wage career ladder potential.
Ø Aggressive promotion of asset development through Individual Development Accounts and similar incentive programs to build savings toward wealth-producing investments, such as homeownership, education, or small business development. Federal roles: assistance in establishing or better capitalizing pilot community development financial institutions; approval to participate in upcoming demonstration programs
Ø Coordination of supportive service delivery with workforce development activity. Federal roles: geographic targeting of day care, health care and other human services to areas of both concentrated poverty and of mass transit opportunities; development of new administrative coordinating capacity for targeted communities.
Ø Build economic literacy. Federal roles: strengthen capacity to provide credit counseling in schools, communities, and workplaces.
2. The spatial mismatches between workforce and job locations, respectively
Ø Increase access to current transportation services. Federal roles: support expansion of pre-paid and discounted transit service, such as the system pioneered by Go Boulder for employee commute purposes; help underwrite innovative finance of transit service expansion in partnership with employers; enable flexible use of existing dollars to support non-traditional types of transit assistance; build a partnership to coordinate currently publicly supported but disconnected services.
Ø Expand transportation system alternatives. Federal roles: enable innovative finance of fixed route (light rail, commuter rail, Amtrak) service expansion through recognizing and aggregating lower income transportation expenditures and entitlements; expand the Federal-local partnership initiated through the recent TCSP award to include a pilot project under the Jobs Access provision of TEA21 (Title V).
Ø Develop affordable housing at both transit-oriented development and within walking distance of employment centers. Federal roles: planning and information tools to better identify land assembly issues and opportunities; incentives for regional agencies and state government to prioritize spatial match opportunities; negotiated investment agreements with federal agencies that support affordable housing finance; partnerships to increase the quality and scope of existing and pending private sector reinvestment agreements.
3. The special burden those environmental conditions may impose on poorer communities and households.
Ø Develop better regional awareness of the geographic incidence of environmental risk. Federal roles: assistance in enabling low income and minority participation in planning and redevelopment organizations; provision of advanced information access and mapping tools.
Ø Targeting of specialized health services. Federal roles: provision of educational and clinical services for asthma and respiratory ailments.
Ø Develop real-time health risk and morbidity tracking systems. Federal roles: information access; new kinds of information infrastructure.
Ø Identification of opportunities to help negotiate settlements on long standing challenges. Federal roles: identify appropriate methods for both community planning and participation in supplemental enforcement programs, in which enforcement settlements result in community investment partnerships.
4. Standing for disadvantaged persons and communities within existing governmental councils and institutions
Ø Ensure adequate representation within State and regional advisory or governing bodies. Federal role: encourage this consideration within current review of the Denver Regional Council of Governments; assistance in providing understanding of compliance with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act with regard to transportation, education and human services provision; development of new capacity at the community level to plan for adequate redevelopment; enable representative capacity to help shape new financial services to be created as the federal support system switches to Electronic Funds Transfer.
5. Coordination between different levels of government
Ø Develop new opportunities to cohere intergovernmental arrangements around the metropolitan area's geography. Federal role: develop performance measures to help perceive the value of this opportunity; explore tie between regulatory flexibility on welfare-to-work and budgetary approvals for block grants.
Ø Convene new leadership around the perceived opportunities. Federal role: create a federal leadership team who can co-convene the necessary parties along with private sector participation.
Ø Use private sector influence to complement intergovernmental activity. Federal role: help identify and aggregate employer influence (both public and private) to bolster case for smarter administration.
6. The challenge of working within a time of economic growth-the marketplace does not conform to formal geographic boundaries
Ø Support and encourage significant community and private sector partnerships with government. Federal role: develop capacity to participate locally and regionally with existing and emerging efforts; develop and assign staff competencies to affirmatively represent both federal and regional interests.
April 30, 1999
The Center for Regional and Neighborhood Action (CRNA) has been asked by the national foundations to serve as a convenor for the metro Denver project.
CRNA after discussion with people currently working in the metropolitan area suggests that two projects be explored. The first proposed project focuses on supporting workers as they deal with childcare, transportation and housing issues, as well as, training and retraining needs identified by private employers. CRNA suggests bringing together a group of key community leaders and key foundation representatives to discuss the feasability of such a project.
CRNA has identified the following individuals as key to initial discussions:
Marva Hammons, Governor Owen’s Executive Director for Human Services;
Shepard Nevel, Director of Policy for the City and County of Denver;
Bruce Alexandar, Executive Director of the Denver Urban Renewal Authority;
Linda Morton, Former Mayor or Lakewood;
Peter Neukirch, Southeast Denver Business Partnership;
Bill Vidal, Executive Director of the Denver Regional Council of Governments; and,
Steve Coffin, Vice President of the Greater Denver Chamber of Commerce.
Representatives from the Denver Foundation, the Rose Community Foundation, the Piton Foundation, the Chambers Foundation, and US Bank Corporate Relations will also be invited to participate in the initial phases of the project. This group will also be asked to identify others who should be involved and frame the issue(s) to be presented.
The second proposed project would focus on land preservation and reuse, transit oriented development, and growth management.
CRNA has identified the following people as key for an initial discussion:
Michael Dowling, Dowling Foundation;
Tom Kaesemeyer, Gates Family Foundation;
Tom Gougeon, Berger Foundation;
Greg Walcher, Colorado Department of Natural Resources;
Will Shafroth, Great Outdoors Colorado;
Scott Woodard, Denver Regional Council of Governments; and,
Gail Klapper, Colorado Forum.
This group will also identify others who should be involved in framing the issue(s) to be addressed.
March 24, 1999
The Center for Regional and Neighborhood Action (CRNA) is pleased to have the opportunity to share some of our thoughts about the potential for a strong Partnership for Regional Livability project in Denver. We believe that Denver provides a unique opportunity that may take some local adjusting to the project model while still honoring the original framework that has been described.
The Uniqueness Factors
Unlike the other three identified sites, Denver does not have in place a major foundation that is a ready partner for collaboration on the project. That fact can be seen as both a challenge and an opportunity. The challenge, of course, is to find the willing funding partner(s) here in the region. We believe that our experience in the Denver foundation community makes that a doable task. The opportunity for us is that most cities don’t have the benefit of large foundations with strong commitments to collaboration and Denver’s experience in building such a partnership can be a model for other communities as the larger, national initiative is designed. Unlike the other project cities, time will be needed to develop the concept in such a way to satisfy the local foundation’s desire to be at "ground zero". We believe that their involvement from its inception not only provides fiscal support but also leads to broad support for strategy development. We are excited by this challenge.
Second, as John has shared with you, CRNA has the ability to provide an expanded support team role in the Denver metropolitan area as well as contribute to the Partnership Steering Committee. The Center for Regional and Neighborhood Action has experience at the local and regional level that we believe can be useful as the Partnership Steering Committee charts its course for the next several months. The principals of our firm share a vast knowledge of the Denver regional community and have shared those experiences with other communities throughout the country. We are eager to bring our expertise to this project.
Next, Mayor Wellington Webb has just recently been selected by his peers as the Chair of the US Conference of Mayors. We have already begun conversations with his key staff on the role his offices might take in the PRL project. Certainly, his interest and involvement can prove to be assets in the outcome of the Denver project and its visibility in front of other large city mayors.
Finally, our experience in the Denver community leads us to suggest that Denver PRL project can be about physical infrastructure and the human needs of the regional community. Our preliminary conversations with key community leaders suggest that the common concerns for the livability of this region revolve around both physical and human infrastructure needs and the intersections between them. We want to look at a pilot project that acknowledges that capital infrastructure (i.e., transportation) is a support for the human needs of the community and the positive ways to bring business leaders, community advocates, foundations and federal/state /local officials together around common regional concerns.
Is Denver Ready?
Denver’s economy is one of the strongest in the country: new businesses moving in; established businesses are expanding; unemployment is at an all time low; and, welfare reform is succeeding in getting the easiest to place into the workforce with jobs that are providing better salaries. And there is a large pool of workers who are ready to take the next step in increasing their skill level. That’s the good news. The bad news is that employers need highly skilled workers now and they can’t find them. Those individuals still on the unemployed list are the least skilled and/or have difficult issues that must be addressed before entering the workplace such as childcare, transportation, and housing.
None of this is real news to Denver’s non-profit or for profit community. In fact, there are several ongoing efforts that are working on different pieces of this:
While this list may seem long, we have, for the sake of space, left off other efforts. The most important point that we can make with this list is that most of these are isolated in their efforts. Cross-fertilization of both ideas and resources has yet to occur. The concern for identifying, training and supporting workers is high in several different areas of our region but, to date, no regional, coordinated effort has begun.
The business community, in the meantime, is shouting for help from anyone or any group that will listen. Frankly, they don’t recognize municipal or county boundaries when they are trying to fill jobs. They know that their want ads are not bringing in the workers they need with the skills they need. And this has led them back to key policy decision makers with a common plea: "Find me a worker with good employment habits and I’ll train them – just find me the worker". But how do the policy makers provide the workers with good employment habits when the workers themselves struggle with childcare, housing and transportation needs. We all know that these three critical areas often determine the success a worker has in getting to the job and staying on the job. Good employment habits now has an expanded definition for single head of household families, the working poor, and undertrained workers that includes the issues we have identified.
The Proposed Project
We believe that the Metro Denver PRL Project should build on the tremendous on going efforts. We don’t want to recreate what already exists. But we suggest that the Denver PRL should focus on developing a more comprehensive approach to the employment, daycare, training, transportation, and housing challenges that face our working community. We see many roles for the national and regional federal government offices in helping to create and support this coordinated effort. Only HUD is involved in any of the projects that we described above. While there are several other regional offices located in Denver, they have been uninvolved in regional efforts. The opportunity is great.
Role of Center for Regional and Neighborhood Action (CRNA)
CRNA is known in the Denver metropolitan region for doing the type of work needed to implement a PRL type project -- designing processes; supporting multi-sectoral involvement; developing stakeholder identification and mobilization; identifying projects; planning short term wins; and, building momentum for system change. Before we get there, though, we need to start out talking about the project to a few key people. We propose to bring together a key group of individuals who can help to formulate the general design of the project and determine the stakeholder outreach. Our initial thoughts lean toward a group of seven individuals:
We have introduced the concept of the PRL project to all these individuals in one-on-one settings and they are eager to continue the conversations within a larger group. In particular, discussions will focus on the opportunities for federal participation as well as other regional participants. Once our foundation partner(s) are identified, this group will expand to include them and then expand once again to begin the collaborative effort.
Simultaneous to our discussions described above, we must find the foundation(s) ready to be a partner with the MacArthur Foundation and the others on PRL. As we mentioned earlier, we don’t believe that finding a funding partner will be difficult. In fact, we have identified three local foundations that we would want to talk to within the next three weeks.
In addition, a robust dialogue involving fifteen foundations on the topic of "Preserving Colorado’s Landscapes and the Quality of Life" convened by the Gates and Dowling Family Foundations offers an important opportunity for convergence, which we intend to link with the Partnership’s activities.
In order to do this, however, it will be important for us to deal with CRNA's role up front. Explaining our role as both local support and national advisor will help get local foundation buy-in. We believe that our work and experience enables us to do both. In particular, with Katherine Archuleta's experience at USDOT and in Denver’s foundation community; Peter Kenney's as a former national consultant on the United States Healthy Communities Initiative; and, John Parr’s as president of the National Civic League and as chair of the Pew Civic Entrepreneurs Initiative and the Institute for the Regional Community, we bring more than just a Colorado focus to PRL. (www.crna.net provides the reader with more bio information)
Conclusion
The energy and vitality that has led Denver from a city of abandoned office buildings and empty streets to one of bustling prosperity has come from its willingness to abandon traditional boundaries and create new ones. Since the early 1980’s, the Denver region has reached deep into its citizen resources and developed a working capital of human and financial resources that have succeeded where many other regions have failed. Collaboration is not a new word here and new collaborations are not something we are afraid of. The opportunity to create new federal collaborations that expand existing efforts and that focus on critical regional issues is one that, we believe, will be eagerly embraced.
Last updated May 24, 1999.