Newsletters
Newsletters
| Economic & Community Development, Featured, Housing, Workforce Development
- Newsletters
- | Economic & Community Development, Featured, Housing, Workforce Development
Dear Colleagues and Partners,
Accelerator for America (AFA) was founded around the idea that the most effective solutions emerge when cities can learn from one another’s experiences and access resources and technical assistance to adapt successful strategies to fit their own unique contexts.
AFA’s Economic Opportunity Accelerators (“Accelerators”) initiative has grown since its inception in 2022 from a small group of economic and community development practitioners to a cross-functional network of nearly 800 local leaders working in Mayors’ offices and city departments, and at housing authorities, transit agencies, workforce boards, community-based nonprofits, and place-based philanthropies in more than 100 cities – all bound by the north star of creating greater economic opportunity for their residents and communities.
“The Economic Opportunity Accelerators network has been helpful in deepening our understanding of how peer localities are tackling economic mobility across the country,” shares AJ Calhoun, Director of Research and Impact for Leading on Opportunity (LOO) in Charlotte, NC. “Our relationship with AFA has sparked ideas for how we can better approach our work going forward, and we’re grateful that AFA has highlighted our work and given us opportunities to share and learn from others!”
To evaluate how the Accelerators network could best support local leaders, AFA worked with a student team from the Wharton School’s Environmental, Social and Governance Initiative in fall 2024 to gather participant feedback, assess best practices from other peer networks, and recommend new strategies. The student research emphasized that network participants value being connected to other practitioners from different cities and regions but desired opportunities for even deeper engagement, enhanced resource sharing, and targeted programming focused on access to capital and generating local funding.
Building on these findings, AFA committed to creating a more strongly connected member base through small group cohorts, amplifying the visibility and accessibility of network resources through a new webpage and members-only resource “hub,” and prioritizing programming focused on funding and capital access. Participation and engagement in the Accelerators sessions has increased as a result. These efforts reflect the network’s evolution from simply broad information sharing into more targeted, actionable support plus continuing to meet participants’ most pressing needs for peer collaboration and practical guidance.
Amid a period of shifting responsibilities between local and federal governments, AFA recently partnered with national peer organizations to provide three research-backed frameworks to the Accelerators network that help local leaders maximize resources. In keeping with AFA’s position as a “Do tank,” we sought to ensure that these are not simply academic resources but can serve as practical decision-making tools to transform how cities approach economic mobility. The Accelerators participated in webinars on the following resources:
Urban Institute’s Upward Mobility Framework: Emphasizes racial equity and five pillars (rewarding work, high-quality education, opportunity-rich neighborhoods, healthy environments, and responsive governance) with 24 measurable predictors. Participants viewed the framework’s data dashboard and highlighted ways to explore mobility metrics within their own communities and leverage peer city comparisons to strengthen their case-making efforts.
Results for America’s Economic Mobility Catalog: A repository of over 50 evidence-based strategies and nearly 200 practices, designed for policymakers, synthesizing research, best practices, and case studies. During the session, representatives from Results for America demonstrated how to identify and select evidence-backed strategies that align with local needs and priorities.
Opportunity Insights’ Opportunity Atlas: This tool provides granular data on economic mobility patterns by neighborhood, demonstrating how community characteristics influence adult outcomes and which characteristics most strongly correlate with upward mobility. During the session, Leading on Opportunity (LOO) shared how this tool helped Charlotte’s transform from 50th to 38th in economic mobility.
Together, these tools empower leaders to make informed budget decisions, build stronger cases for policy changes, and target interventions more effectively.
While having access to robust economic mobility frameworks is foundational, implementation requires partnership building, risk management, community engagement, and funding strategy. Recent Accelerators network sessions have centered around forging effective philanthropic partnerships, conducting vulnerability assessments to identify potential weak points before crises emerge, and using data to strengthen community support for local ballot measures.
Los Angeles County’s Measure A, which secured 58% voter approval for a permanent half-cent sales tax generating $1.2 billion annually for affordable housing and homelessness prevention, served as the example of how cities can successfully build campaigns to fund local priorities. LA’s success stemmed from a broad coalition that included not only housing advocates but also healthcare professionals, local unions concerned about workforce housing security, and philanthropy partners like the California Community Foundation. No matter the size of the city, successful ballot initiatives require years of education and engagement, trust building, and demonstration of measurable impact before asking the community to invest additional resources.
As cities prepare for federal funding declines, philanthropic institutions can act as a powerful partner to support both crisis response and long-term systemic change. Through compelling examples from Detroit and Scranton, Accelerator participants learned how philanthropy can serve as “first movers” to de-risk investment during economic downturns, while community foundations can leverage diverse funding streams, including donor-advised funds, CRA capital, and healthcare conversion foundations, to create sustainable infrastructure even in resource-constrained environments.
Throughout the sessions, panelists emphasized the critical importance of building resilient cross-sector partnerships that can weather changes in federal priorities or economic downturns, ensuring that essential programs are sustainable long term.
For local leaders interested in receiving future communication and program offerings with the Economic Opportunity Accelerators network, please contact stephanie@acceleratorforamerica.org.
AFA is grateful for the support of our Economic Opportunity Accelerators network funders, including The Kresge Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, and NEO Philanthropy.
