Learn how community development organizations help create places of opportunity where ALL people live with dignity while participating in and benefiting from our Commonwealth's economy.
MACDC advocates on behalf of our members and the communities they serve to create the public and private sector policies that will promote community development throughout Massachusetts.
MACDC’s programs and services are designed to support our members in specific areas of community development and to strengthen the effectiveness of the broader community development system.
The Community Investment Tax Credit provides a 50% state refundable tax credit for donations to selected Community Development Corporations in Massachusetts.
MACDC provides a variety of online resources from job listings at member organizations to community development reports and research. This information is updated frequently.
On June 1, 2011, the Joint Committee on Small Business and Community Development held a hearing at the Massachusetts State House on the Community Development Partnership Act.
Collaboration has become such a popular word in our field that one wonders at times whether it has lost its meaning and importance. Has collaboration become a cliché? Is it a passing fad? Has it been oversold?
I would have to say, from what I am seeing in Massachusetts and around the country, that the answer is an emphatic no!
The first meeting I ever attended on behalf of MACDC – way back in 1993 – was at the Bowdoin Street Community Health Center. The purpose of the meeting was to strategize ways to reduce childhood lead poisoning by building a coalition of community development, housing, environmental and public health advocates to fight for changes in policy and practice that would better protect our children.
Performance and accountability are the subject of substantial discussion these days throughout the nonprofit sector. Government agencies, private funders and non-profit leaders themselves are increasingly focused on taking steps to ensure that we fund programs "that work" and stop funding those "that don't". Last week, I wrote about Social Impact Bonds, a new approach for doing this about which I have serious concerns.
A new report by Enterprise Community Partners provides an insightful analysis into the financial challenges facing community developers and offers thoughtful recommendations for how to address them at the organizational and system levels. It should be required reading for all community developers and their supporters.
Throughout my years at MACDC, I have been an active participant in a network of CDC associations from around the country. The network – first convened by the National Congress for Community Economic Development and now by the National Alliance of Community Economic Development Associations (NACEDA) – provides an opportunity to learn about programs and policies in other states that might be applicable in Massachusetts. (It’s also a great place to commiserate with the very small group of people who do the same work we do at MACDC!)
Last month I travelled to Indianapolis to attend a meeting of the Institute for Comprehensive Community Development's National Advisory Committee and to tour some of Indianapolis’ hardest hit neighborhoods. It was inspiring to see how local CDCs and CBOs are working together and with LISC and other partners to undertake long term and comprehensive community development initiatives. Indianapolis has had a strong CDC sector for many years, thanks in part to support from LISC, the City, the Eli Lilly Foundation and other supporters.
MACDC hosted its 5th Biannual Convention on Saturday, October 16, 2010 at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester and once again it was an inspiring and exciting event. MACDC began hosting Conventions in 2002, shortly after I became the Executive Director, as a way to bring together the full spectrum of leaders in the CDC field – board members, residents, and professional staff; Nonprofit allies, funders and public officials; long-time leaders and emerging ones; black, brown and white; young and old; urban, rural and
This past week, I had the opportunity to make presentations in Washington, DC and in Boston about the future of the community development field. On September 28 I gave a presentation to the National Coalition for Asian and Pacific Islander Community Development on 21st Century CDCs as part of a Town Hall Forum on the future of Community Development. More than 200 practitioners that serve Asian and Pacific Islander communities across the country engaged in a lively and interesting discussion
