MACDC staff provides technical assistance on a range of topics to our members. As an MADC member, you are welcome to reach out to staff whenever you would like a thought partner in your work, or to learn more about local community development networks and partners. We are always happy to chat, direct you to resources, and share successful strategies.  We can also link you to other MACDC members or support new staff or leadership onboarding. The following are a few specific areas that we can provide guidance: 

Crisis Management & Organizational Challenges – Unfortunately, CDCs like other non-profits and organizations of all types, occasionally face a challenge or crisis that can threaten the organization’s reputation or even its ability to operate.  Thankfully, many CDCs have recovered from these challenges to become stronger organizations. MACDC has engaged with many CDCs over the years and can be a helpful and confidential thought partner in this process.  

Executive Transition – In recent years, a number of CDC Executive Directors have retired or moved on to new opportunities and MACDC can help boards of directors during this process by identifying search consultants and/or interim directors or by helping the board to evaluate their needs in a new leader. 

Fundraising: General – MACDC provides fundraising support to our members as they strive to increase funding for both existing and new programs. From reviewing comprehensive program funding initiatives, to discussing specific opportunities, MACDC staff have decades of fundraising experience upon which our fundraising technical assistance is based upon. 

Fundraising: Community Investment Tax Credit – MACDC is a designated CITC Community Support Organization by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts Department of Housing and Community Development. In this role, MACDC staff provide significant feedback and advice to our members participating in program as they diversify their funding base, engage prospective new supporters, and work to sustain a growing donor community. 

Fundraising: Health – MACDC works with CDCs to apply for funding from hospitals, health foundations, or other health funds. Historically, this has included strategizing how to frame a CDC’s work from a health equity lens, identifying overlapping priorities with the potential funder, and visioning new directions for work in the health space.

Health Equity – MACDC works with CDC staff to facilitate increased engagement in the health equity space. In addition to hospital engagement and fundraising, this includes thinking together about ways to make an intentional organizational commitment to health equity, including staffing decisions and duties, and engagement in MACDC’s Health Equity work. 

Hospital Engagement – MACDC works with CDC staff to strategize ways to initiate and strengthen relationships with local hospitals. We can offer help with understanding a hospital’s commitment to their local community, understanding a hospitals Community Benefits report, and ways to get involved in local Community Health Needs Assessments and hospital committees. 

Information Technology – MACDC provides technical assistance on topics ranging from cloud computing to automation to help our members implement technology and operational processes that increase their organization’s capacity and allows for staff to focus on working more effectively with community members and residents.

MACDC’s Peer Groups – MACDC offers a range of practitioner peer groups to encourage professional networking, sharing of best practices and engaging in discussions exploring issues related to CDCs and community development. Currently, MACDC has the following active peer groups: The Boston Committee, CITC, Communications & Marketing, Community Business Network, Community Organizing, Energy Cohort, Health Equity Committee, Housing & Real Estate, Operations & Technology, Resident Services Coordinators, Small Business Development, and the Western MA Development Collaborative. Learn more about these groups here. 

MACDC’s Racial Equity Pledge – We can assist you in joining on to the Racial Equity Pledge and related activities. 

Management/Governance – MACDC can help CDC executives as they navigate all sorts of management challenges related to their boards of directors, human resources, financial strength, and other aspects of running a non-profit organization.

Policy and Practice related to Massachusetts Affordable Housing – MACDC staff can work with CDC staff to discuss a variety of topics related to Massachusetts affordable housing, including real estate development, climate and energy, and housing programs (housing rehab, homebuyer counseling, etc.) 

Political Strategy – Community development inevitably interacts with the political world and MACDC can offer seasoned guidance and a confidential thought partner as CDCs deal with these challenges. 

Resident Leadership Academy and Leadership development – We can assist in thinking through your relationship with community members and how to develop leaders in the community.

Small Business Development – MACDC is committed to supporting our members in bridging essential resources and providing technical assistance support. We remain active in our strong partnerships within the small business networks, to ensure we advocate for the priorities of our members. These priorities include Access to Capital, Supplier Diversity, Small Business lending/CDFI funding, Grants and most recently COVID Relief resources. In addition, we host small business support networks for TA providers and connect our members to local and state advocacy efforts that support policy work in the field.  We encourage all our members to see MACDC as a robust resource that can help drive economic sustainability in the communities they serve.

Strategic Planning – MACDC frequently meets with CDC boards of directors, senior staff and/or consultants to help them with their strategic planning. We can offer help with environmental scans, trends in the sector and reflections on organizational strengths and weaknesses.

Other areas that we have historically provided assistance include: career networking, community organizing, professional development, resident services, and small business development. If you would like assistance in one of these areas or in any other area and are not sure of the most appropriate person to contact, please reach out to Amanda Kahan and she can connect you to the correct person. We are here to support you in your work! 

As the MACDC staff and board gear up for our 40th Anniversary Year, I took a few moments over the holidays to review our five-year Strategic Plan to make sure we were on track with the priorities and strategies adopted by the board in 2018.  While the COVID-19 Pandemic has certainly disrupted everything about our work, I do think the five core priorities in our plan remain helpful and highly relevant. With that in mind, I’m excited to highlight some of the exciting programs and initiatives we have on tap for 2022 to advance each of our core priorities. 

Build the power and voice of lower-income people and people of color to shape the future of their communities and their own lives 

Last year, MACDC’s Mel King Institute launched the Resident Leadership Training Collaborative  to expand capacity to develop resident and tenant leaders across the state.  The program builds on our five-year track record of training and supporting tenant leaders in public housing to offer similar leadership development opportunities to tenants living in CDC properties and potentially other subsidized housing. The program enhances trainings and programs that the Institute already offers to CDC board members. 

Speaking of board members and resident leaders, MACDC will once again be hosting our Convention this fall. Ever since our first convention in 2002, these gatherings have been the most exciting and meaningful events on the MACDC calendar as resident leaders, community development professionals, and allies come together for a day of learning, celebration, and action. As in past years, the Convention will include a Gubernatorial Candidate Forum where we will ask the candidates to make specific commitments to our field and our communities.  

Of course, the 2022 Convention faces the unprecedented challenge of a global pandemic, so it is likely to look and feel different from past events, but one way or another we will make it happen in October 2022. The details will be coming as we figure them out, but it will certainly include a Gubernatorial Candidate Forum, inspiring speakers, awards, networking, learning, the CDC Roll Call, and a celebration of our 40th Anniversary! 

Expand affordable housing in places where low- and moderate-income people can thrive 

As I wrote in an earlier blog, 2022 will be a busy year for affordable housing. MACDC will be focused on helping our members access the newly available ARPA funding while also advocating for additional ARPA dollars as the Legislature determines how to spend the remaining $2.3 billion. While ARPA is providing an exciting infusion of funding, we know that it won’t be enough to meet our housing crisis, so we also plan to continue campaigning for the HERO Bill, which would generate $350 million per year or more for housing and climate investments. We will also prioritize efforts to ensure that tenants and homeowners who have faced financial hardship during the pandemic receive the assistance they need and are not displaced. 

Another key focus area in 2022 will be closing the racial homeownership gap. New ARPA funding will provide an opportunity to expand the production of affordable homeownership units as well as expand down payment assistance and mortgage subsidies. As part of these efforts, MACDC will be engaged in a long overdue conversation about how to help first-time and first-generation homebuyers build family wealth, while also ensuring long-term affordability for future homebuyers. This can be a challenging conversation, but it is important as we seek to redress the racial wealth gap. 

MACDC is also excited to see our Neighborhood Stabilization work expand in 2022 as we partner with MassHousing to implement a new round of funding for the Neighborhood Hub, along with newly available capital dollars to support property rehab. 

Reduce income and wealth inequality across the state 

Last year, MACDC helped co-found the Coalition for an Equitable Economy, which seeks to eliminate racial disparities in business ownership by 2030. The Coalition has already had an extraordinary impact in helping small businesses survive the pandemic. We are now poised – with new funding and (soon) new staff – to build a strong small business eco-system that can help entrepreneurs at every stage of business development, from conception onward. MACDC will continue to staff the Community Business Network, which convenes practitioners monthly for peer learning, advocacy, and collaboration. We plan to expand our training programs for small business practitioners. Of course, advocacy will be a key part of our program as we push to secure additional ARPA funding for small businesses and advocate for increased funding for the Small Business Technical Assistance program. 

Another key agenda for 2022 is to help our members strengthen their supplier diversity efforts in both construction and property management. Building on the success of the Boston Pilot Program, we hope to expand this work statewide in 2022.  

In 2022, we will also join with progressives across the state to help pass the Massachusetts Fair Share Amendment on the November ballot to make sure that millionaires pay their fair share toward education and transportation investments in the Commonwealth.   

Drive the convergence of community development and community health 

MACDC was focused on driving the convergence of community development and health equity long before the COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated in cruel fashion the impact of safe, stable, affordable housing on health outcomes. In 2022, we will step up these efforts with the work of our Housing Quality and Health Task Force, a cross-sector group of professionals that will be developing and implementing new strategies for reducing the health problems caused by substandard housing. One of our key priorities will be securing ARPA funding for the Massachusetts Healthy Homes initiative, so we can remove health hazards, such as lead paint, mold, pest infestation and other problems that undermine good health. 

We also recognize the deep connection between climate change, green buildings, and good health. Toward that end, MACDC is partnering with LISC and New Ecology to implement the DASH Program (Decarbonizing Affordable Subsidized Housing) to help our members build new and renovate existing housing to make it clean and resilient.  

Promote racial equity within the field and the Commonwealth 

MACDC has increasingly taken steps to apply a racial equity lens to all our work, including virtually every program and initiative mentioned above, from closing racial disparities in homeownership, business, and health, to changing who has voice and power in our communities. At the same time, we are taking explicit steps to address diversity, equity, and inclusion within the community development field itself, including our own organization. This work is being organized around the MACDC Racial Equity Pledge, which we launched at our Annual Meeting last November. With 14 CDCs already signed on, this campaign seeks to help our members individually and collectively adopt state-of-the-art practices for diversity, equity, and inclusion. MACDC and the Mel King Institute will support these efforts with peer-to-peer learning, training, data collection and collective accountability.  

A closing thought 

A short blog can’t capture everything that we will be doing in 2022. Of course, in these uncertain times I suspect that new, completely unanticipated issues will emerge throughout the year.  

That said, I want to acknowledge one more major undertaking that will consume much of our energy in 2022 even though it was not in our 2018 strategic plan – enduring this awful pandemic.  Like many, I thought we’d be past the worst of it by now and maybe we are. But we know that this will continue to be a very difficult time for all of us – some more than others.   

For community developers, we must ask ourselves: How can we stay focused on our agenda, but be adaptive to changing needs? How do we build and sustain relationships while staying safe and often apart? How do we remain hopeful in the face of so much sadness? Navigating this is exhausting. We need to give ourselves and each other the time and space to keep ourselves healthy – physically and emotionally. 

As we work on the many projects and programs described above, we ask for your patience and support and we pledge ours in return. 

We are in this together and I’m so grateful for that! 

The MA Division of Banks (DOB) has posted the RFP for grant funding in support of first-time homeownership counseling programs and for regional foreclosure education centers, under Chapter 206 of the Acts of 2007. MACDC’s advocacy was pivotal to passage of the law, which also for the first-time regulated Massachusetts non-bank lenders. 

Eligibility, submission, and other important details are available in the bid RFP.  To access the bid visit www.commbuys.com, enter bid number ‘69422’ in the top search bar and click the search button. For easy reference, here is the RFP. 

In prior years, eligible applicants were limited to those previously awarded Chapter 206 funding. We heard from several MACDC Members who provide homebuyer education and/or foreclosure prevention counseling, and were not eligible to apply for Chapter 206 funding by virtue of not being awarded grants in prior years.  In response, we recommended to DOB that they broaden eligibility to include certified CDCs and organizations who are recipients of the Collaborative Seal of Approval by the Massachusetts Homeownership Collaborative.  DOB accepted our recommendation, and broadened eligibility. 

All proposals are due no later than January 14, 2022. If you have any questions pertaining to the RFP, they must be submitted to DOB via e-mail to chapter206grants@mass.gov before 5pm January 6, 2022. 

On December 9th, I participated in a half-day “Public Conversation on Eliminating Lead Poisoning in 2022.” Rick Reibstein, a lecturer in BU’s Earth and Environment department, organized the event to bring together individuals who are thinking about ways to combat the presence of lead in our environment. The presence of lead in our environment is a serious public health threat, as any amount of lead in the body can hurt the brain, kidneys, and nervous system, slow down growth and development, make it hard to learn, damage hearing and speech, and cause behavior problems. These problems are particularly harmful to children who absorb lead more easily than adults and who are still growing and developing.  

Rick asked if I’d speak about MACDC’s efforts to secure $100 million in ARPA funding to support a Massachusetts Healthy Homes Initiative (MHHI). We proposed that this $100 million be split between rehabilitating older housing stock and removing lead paint. The presence of lead paint in homes in Massachusetts is a significant problem since over 70% of homes in Massachusetts were constructed before lead paint was banned in 1978. All homes built before 1978 are likely to contain some lead-based paint which can be inhaled or ingested unless steps have already been taken to make them lead-safe or remove that lead paint. We estimated that a $50 million investment would be sufficient to make an additional 2,000 Massachusetts homes lead-safe, preventing developmental delays and other serious health consequences in thousands of children. While our recommendation was not adopted in the state ARPA bill, we were able to identify a number of legislative champions who we hope we’ll be able to call upon to support de-leading funding down the line, including the approximately $2 billion in unspent ARPA funding allocated to Massachusetts.  

In addition to sharing our advocacy efforts, the conference provided an opportunity for me to learn more about the history and politics of federal and state lead laws as well as other efforts to combat lead-poisoning around the state. One of these efforts is An Act Enhancing Justice for Families Harmed by Lead which would hold lead paint manufacturers responsible for the harm knowingly caused by lead. Advocates are additionally working on bills that would ban lead in jewelry, toys, and pottery, that would lower the level at which children are considered to be lead poisoned, that would regulate the presence of outdoor lead paint, and that would address discrimination against families stemming from the current Massachusetts lead law. The conference was an opportunity to bring together people working on addressing the hazards of lead from a variety of vantage points. For me, it was inspiring to learn about these crucial efforts. If you want to check out the event, including my presentation, you can access the recording here.