Connected Corridor - Executive Summary
The Atlantic Avenue corridor, a main thoroughfare of the City of Long Beach, California, is an 8-mile by 1-mile corridor that bisects the city from north to south. In doing so it encapsulates the rich, socio-economic demographics and several of the City Council Districts that characterize the city’s diversity, which in 2006 was rated the most diverse in the nation. With a mixed use of commercial and residential properties, the neighborhoods along the Corridor are vastly different from each other, but all share the scars of blight and economic challenges. Some of these neighborhoods were in the center of the Long Beach riots during the aftermath of the Rodney King trial in 1992, and have long been a focus for investments by the Long Beach Redevelopment Agency (RDA) using a traditional bricks-and-mortar approach.
The Atlantic Avenue corridor, a main thoroughfare of the City of Long Beach, California, is an 8-mile by 1-mile corridor that bisects the city from north to south. In doing so it encapsulates the rich, socio-economic demographics and several of the City Council Districts that characterize the city’s diversity, which in 2006 was rated the most diverse in the nation. With a mixed use of commercial and residential properties, the neighborhoods along the Corridor are vastly different from each other, but all share the scars of blight and economic challenges. Some of these neighborhoods were in the center of the Long Beach riots during the aftermath of the Rodney King trial in 1992, and have long been a focus for investments by the Long Beach Redevelopment Agency (RDA) using a traditional bricks-and-mortar approach.
The Long Beach Community Foundation (LBCF), whose mission is to initiate positive change for Long Beach through charitable giving, stewardship and strategic grant-making, saw an opportunity to supplement this traditional approach by connecting and developing the “social infrastructure” of the Corridor. Utilizing the socio-demographic data developed by ReThinking Greater Long Beach, a self-described community-based think tank, LBCF selected the Corridor for a unique demonstration project. With funds provided by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation’s Transformation Initiative, LBCF funded Leadership Long Beach (LLB) to manage the project and also provided oversight through its Grants Committee and staff over a four-year period from 2007 to 2011.
Leadership Long Beach re-named the project the Connected Corridor, and with their Steering Committee and a hired Project Director, Carina Cristiano, set forth on a mission of: transforming neighborhoods into one community by creating connectivity and empowering stakeholders from the top of the town to downtown. The Corridor was divided into four phases based on the natural boundaries of the neighborhoods. LBCF Board and Staff felt that if this project could successfully weave a common community fabric out of these diverse neighborhoods, a blueprint could be developed for replication in other corridors of the city – or even in other cities with similar issues and concerns. In anticipation of this possibility, LBCF provided a grant to ReThinking Greater Long Beach to conduct studies of two other corridors, Santa Fe Avenue and Pacific Coast Highway, both of which were next in the City’s redevelopment plans.
The formal work of the Connected Corridor began in 2007 and concluded in 2011. With a social infrastructure focus, the Connected Corridor cannot point to a physical building or statue to claim as the final product of its work. When a project is about people, the results are relationships, collaborations, and partnerships. A key factor in our success with the Connected Corridor was listening to what the local people had to say. This created stronger connections from the top of the town to downtown, and the resulting exchange of ideas fostered a more vibrant community along the Corridor. The real measure of this project’s success will not be known for years; however, we are trusting that some of the social tools we have developed will become permanent features of the local infrastructure. Only time will tell.
Leadership Long Beach re-named the project the Connected Corridor, and with their Steering Committee and a hired Project Director, Carina Cristiano, set forth on a mission of: transforming neighborhoods into one community by creating connectivity and empowering stakeholders from the top of the town to downtown. The Corridor was divided into four phases based on the natural boundaries of the neighborhoods. LBCF Board and Staff felt that if this project could successfully weave a common community fabric out of these diverse neighborhoods, a blueprint could be developed for replication in other corridors of the city – or even in other cities with similar issues and concerns. In anticipation of this possibility, LBCF provided a grant to ReThinking Greater Long Beach to conduct studies of two other corridors, Santa Fe Avenue and Pacific Coast Highway, both of which were next in the City’s redevelopment plans.
The “top of the town,” otherwise known as North Long Beach, was specifically selected as a place to begin the connectivity work, because it is an area often neglected in the priorities for development. If stakeholders could be convinced of the sincerity of our efforts and our intention to inform and engage them in activities that could empower them, we would also be sending a message to others along the Corridor of the seriousness of our intentions.
To fulfill our mission, ongoing communication was necessary at all times through every medium available, including going to community and neighborhood meetings, one-on-one contacts, community forums and the use of online social networks. In demonstrating connectivity first-hand, we engaged stakeholders by providing information, let them set the agendas, listened to their ideas about how to solve their problems, and inspired them to action to address the issues they identified. The idea was to develop relationships and partnerships among varied stakeholders and not simply to provide funds for projects.
Through its Transformation Initiative, the Knight Foundation provided LBCF a total of $1.9 million, a substantial portion of which was designated for direct use in the Connected Corridor. This included project management and a unique grant-making process in each of the four phases – which presented another challenge to identify the best use of the funds earmarked for each phase. We adopted a process of stakeholders submitting proposals for programs to address the identified needs, and, based on the authentic relationships established and the engagement in the process, we funded the projects designed to assist in transforming the neighborhood. Those not engaged in the process and connectivity of the Corridor misunderstood the purpose of the grants which did cause some minor friction, particularly among some traditional nonprofit leaders.
With its emphasis on connecting people with people and people with resources, the Connected Corridor opened up communications with people and organizations previously unknown to each other. Residents became more knowledgeable about current needs, partnerships were developed across neighborhoods and phases, and a common occurrence was attendance at Meet and Greet sessions by stakeholders from all phases. This type of role-modeling served to unite people all along the Connected Corridor and resulted in overcoming barriers to successful collaborations
The Connected Corridor phase grants provided an opportunity for local people to develop and sharpen their skills in program planning, service delivery and program coordination. Small business owners, grassroots organizations, and nonprofit organizations benefited from this seed money, and many developed or expanded their programs to include more stakeholders or partners. Those who fully understood the foundations of this project became ambassadors within and outside their own neighborhoods.
Some projects funded by LBCF through the Transformation Initiative resulted from discoveries made in the Connected Corridor process. A ground swell of support arose in North Long Beach for a neighborhood newspaper which resulted in the weekly Uptown Gazette, a publication of Gazette Newspapers. A subsequent partner program established a journalism program at the Fairfield Family YMCA for participating youth to author, design, and publish a bi-monthly two-page advertisement, ConnectLB, for the Uptown Gazette.
The Connected Corridor has been evaluated by an independent group of social scientists, and all indications point to our success in weaving four distinct communities into one. The project has shown that when social infrastructure development is combined with traditional bricks and mortar development, it unleashes the creativity of residents and results in their doing more for themselves with their own assets. Several “take-aways” can be mentioned along with this successful project including the “can do” attitude now existing among participants and even those who just heard about it; a blueprint narrative with the potential to guide similar projects in the future; an independent evaluation with suggestions for other potential social infrastructure-building projects; a smart phone application for residents and visitors to easily obtain information about the Connected Corridor; and an online database for Long Beach, available free-of-charge to communities, professionals, researchers and policy-makers.
