Giving Compass' Take:

• Stanford Social Innovation Review shares that the current approach to community revitalization has helped arrest and even reverse the degradation of American neighborhoods, but it cannot solve the problem without local ownership and the de-commodification of property.

• How can communities run themselves without the help of an outside organization? What can donors and policymakers do to boost communities sense of self and independence? 

• Learn about supporting equity in funding practices for communities in need. 

Every weekday morning, Yuselly Mendoza walks the streets of Olneyville, a low-income, predominately Latino neighborhood on the west side of Providence, Rhode Island. She and another woman don bright yellow jackets and set out at 8:05 from the corner of Salmon Street and Manton Avenue, across the street from Sanchez Liquors and a vacant, weed-choked lot. They follow a route that meanders through the neighborhood, stopping along the way to pick up schoolchildren who walk with them, before reaching the William D’Abate Elementary School. A total of about 35 kids take the Walking School Bus, joining either with Yuselly on her walk (the “blue route”) or with two other adults, who take a different path through the neighborhood (the “green route”). And every afternoon at 3:30, Yuselly and the other women retrace their steps as they walk the children home. There’d be more kids on the bus if it weren’t for rules that require a certain ratio of adults to children; since there isn’t enough funding to hire another adult, the bus has a waiting list.

Read the full article about the need for neighborhood trusts by Joseph Margulies at Stanford Social Innovation Review