Community Impact – Page 31 – Knight Foundation

Program Area: Community Impact

Public spaces are essential in any community because they provide the space for residents to gather, play, learn, dream and connect. Knight invests in public spaces and the public life of cities to foster engagement and attachment to place. We believe great public spaces don’t just happen—they require creative leadership and engaged neighbors to plan, design, program and operate. This was a key topic of discussion at the inaugural Knight Public Spaces Forum held in Philadelphia this summer. 

Forum attendees—275 in all—came from across North America to share their experiences and learn from peers. These artists, planners and designers, librarians, neighborhood champions, local government leaders, recreation and parks representatives, and technologists represent the expanding and inclusive field of practice that is driving public spaces today. Through community workshops, sessions and informal discussions, participants spent two days exploring how they can engage others to advance the role of public spaces in fostering more informed and engaged communities.

<p><em>Sabina Ali, Chair, Thorncliffe Park Women’s Committee, at Knight Public Spaces Forum 2019 </em></p>
Sabina Ali, Chair, Thorncliffe Park Women’s Committee, at Knight Public Spaces Forum 2019 

The forum also provided a platform for Knight to expand its commitment to public space leadership. During the program kick-off, seven proven, innovative public space leaders were named Knight Public Space Fellows. Each fellow received $150,000 in flexible funding that will provide them with the space and freedom to unleash their creativity. They will also have access to opportunities to work with and learn from each other and to elevate their work to a wider audience. We believe by giving these individuals resources, flexibility and a network—powerful innovation can occur.

Here are our top five insights from the forum:

  1. Develop community engagement as an ongoing strategy for your public space work. Several speakers discussed the need to rethink engagement strategies. Engagement with residents and other stakeholders should be an ongoing strategy, not simply a one-time goal to meet. This is best achieved when the focus is on building trust and sustaining authentic relationships with your community. 
  2. Make equity the foundation. Ensuring that public spaces live up to their full potential as places for all means that principles of equity must be embedded from the start. Setting equity as the foundation means reconsidering every aspect of planning, designing, programming and managing public spaces to achieve fairness in process and outcomes. 
  3. Take time to look up and out. It’s easy to get caught up in the day-to-day aspects of managing public spaces, but it’s also important to look ahead at the trends and forces that will impact public spaces in the future. In Philadelphia, we were able to look up and out – in person— at various world class projects including Bartram’s Garden, Centennial Commons and Cherry Street Pier. Moreover, attendees identified several areas that intersect with public spaces—climate change, slow growth cities and smart cities—for further exploration.
  4. Prioritize opportunities for peer exchange. While attendees and speakers used the forum to share research, toolkits and other resources driving their work, they also noted how important it is for this field to come together for in-person learning. As this field continues to grow and develop, sharing resources — policy frameworks, messaging guides, outreach tools — for what works and identifying knowledge and resource gaps is that much more essential.
  5. Leverage both data and storytelling for reporting. Engaging storytelling is a necessary, but sometimes overlooked, element in building community support public spaces. One way to tell more meaningful stories is to bolster the narrative with data points that resonate with community members as well as local officials. It’s not enough to measure and report on outputs. Instead, the focus should be on measuring what matters to the community in an effort to demonstrate how a public space can further those goals.

Interested in learning more? View presentations and resources from the Knight Public Spaces Forum and watch Instagram Story updates live from the event. Learn more about Knight’s public spaces work here.

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Lilly Weinberg is director of community foundations at Knight Foundation.

Lynn Ross is the founder and principal of Spirit for Change Consulting, LLC; she is Knight Foundation’s lead consultant for its work supporting Reimagining the Civic Commons and the Knight Public Spaces Forum.

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On Oct. 23, 2019, Knight announced nearly $700,000 in new investments to foster a more connected, vibrant and prosperous Historic West End. Charles Thomas, Knight director in Charlotte, shares more about our work in the area below. 

Charlotte is at a crossroads, or at several crossroads, really.  

As you walk past the cranes and construction and hear reports of 60 new people arriving daily, it’s easy to overlook our bustling city’s persistent challenges related to economic mobility and opportunity.

With Charlotte’s growing economy and rapid development, historic and underserved neighborhoods outside of center city are experiencing rapid transition. Residents in these communities — such as those in the Historic West End — are excited about the chance to reap the benefits of growth. However, they also fear being priced out and displaced because they won’t have a voice in the development process or decision-making.

At Knight, we feel this is a critical moment in Charlotte’s growth to invest in a more informed and engaged community by supporting an approach to development that puts residents at the center of the conversation in order to foster vibrant, inclusive places with high economic opportunity.  

Since 2015, Knight has focused our efforts in the Historic West End district at Five Points and the three neighborhoods adjacent to Johnson C. Smith University.  The goal is to take advantage of new, substantial public and private investments in the area to design and implement a vision that reflects the desires of its residents, students and businesses. Our investments focus on three areas:

  • Promoting community engagement and ensuring Historic West End residents are connected to and participating in the corridor’s growth.
  • Increasing the neighborhood’s capacity to develop and drive a community vision. 
  • Supporting the creation and programming of public spaces and hubs that foster interaction and connection among residents.

Our investments have included support for  Charlotte Center City Partners and Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC), coordinating community development, building neighborhood capacity and developing anti-displacement strategies; the Five Points Community Collaborative and Historic West End Partners’ efforts to engage residents and support small businesses in the corridor; capacity building for the West Side Land Trust; and the pilot of Urban Main Street with the City of Charlotte to revitalize commercial districts. We also supported Project LIFT’s work to engage parents and improve digital literacy and internet connectivity for West End families. Including nearly $700,000 in new funding announced today, Knight has invested more than $5 million in West Charlotte since 2015.

Charlotte is at a crossroads, facing tough decisions that require input from grassroots leaders, nonprofits and private businesses alike. To ensure our city’s growth supports all Charlotteans, it’s critical that residents have access to the tools and resources necessary to guide public and private investment to foster neighborhoods of high opportunity.

What narratives are we going to choose to shape our city? At Knight, we hope Charlotte’s story can be one of connected communities and economic opportunity for all.

Charles Thomas is Knight’s director in Charlotte. You can follow him on Twitter at @cthomasclt.

Photo (top): West Charlotte community residents and friends participating in the land trust’s second community charrette. Courtesy of West Side Community Land Trust. 

Contact: Lauren Dickinson, Communications Officer, John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, 305.908.2694, [email protected]

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Oct. 23, 2019 — The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation today announced nearly $700,000 in new funding for nine projects aimed at expanding economic opportunity, supporting resident engagement, and increasing vibrancy in Charlotte’s Historic West End. The new funding brings Knight’s total investment in West Charlotte to over $5 million since 2015.

From a community-led land trust, to an initiative to strengthen the area’s business district, to an economic development study, several of the projects focus on enabling residents of the Historic West End to improve their ability to shape and benefit from the rapid growth being experienced by the Charlotte region. Other projects — including a fellowship program to engage residents in neighborhood improvement efforts and the development of a community-based journalism initiative — are focused on helping the community stay connected, discuss important issues and better preserve the West End’s identity in a time of change.

“Charlotte is experiencing impressive growth in population, ideas, and opportunity—yet this brings new challenges,” said Charles Thomas, Knight Foundation program director in Charlotte. “As our city moves forward, long-term success hinges on ensuring all neighborhoods and residents can participate in and benefit from our region’s progress. These nine projects will do just that for the Historic West End, helping it secure its spot as an inclusive and thriving residential, commercial and university corridor.”

The projects receiving support are:

Historic West End Partners ($160,000): To support Historic West End Partners hiring full-time staff, providing programs to develop small businesses, and elevating the brand of the Historic West End.

West Side Community Land Trust ($125,000): To increase the capacity and presence of the West Side Community Land Trust by supporting full-time staff and the acquisition and development of several properties.

GlennOaks Media LLC ($125,000): To engage residents in a community-based journalism initiative with Qcitymetro, which will host a series of events to determine residents’ news needs and employ a reporter to cover issues affecting the neighborhood.  

The City of Charlotte ($100,000): To build on the engagement around Charlotte’s Aging in Program and to improve connecting residents with existing resources to improve quality of life.

League of Creative Interventionists ($75,000): To support the Charlotte League of Creative Interventionists’ 2019 Fellowship program, which will recruit four fellows to engage and train Historic West End residents and youth in beautifying, activating and programming Lakewood Park.  

Five Points Community Collaborative ($46,700): To support programming and events that advance neighborhood engagement and collaboration among the three neighborhoods at Five Points in Historic West End.

Northwest Corridor Council of Elders ($32,000): To advance the capacity of the Council of Elders – a gathering of West Side community leaders – to host community convenings and events that foster a shared vision and goals for Historic West End residents.

The City of Charlotte ($14,865): To support a business and economic development study of the intersection of Beatties Ford Road and Lasalle Street, with a focus on findings that can inform and support resident engagement.

United Way of Central Carolinas ($14,000): To strengthen neighborhood leadership by working with and training leaders from several neighborhood organizations through Duke University’s Nonprofit Certificate Management Program.

Learn more about this announcement in a blog post by Knight’s Charlotte Program Director Charles Thomas.

About the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation
Knight Foundation is a national foundation with strong local roots. We invest in journalism, in the arts, and in the success of cities where brothers John S. and James L. Knight once published newspapers. Our goal is to foster informed and engaged communities, which we believe are essential for a healthy democracy. For more, visit kf.org.

Image (top): 50 Plates community dinner, courtesy of League of Creative Interventionists. Photo Credit: DeOren Robinson.

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