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Nexus July Investment Actions

On July 20th, 2010 Nexus Community Partners approved our fourth round of grants for 2010. The grants represented work being done in two of our three geographic areas; South Minneapolis and East St. Paul.

Below you will find a brief summary of the grants:

Casa de Esperanza
Purpose: Nexus Funds will support the East Side Latino Community Engagement Project and the Centro de Informacion y Recursos information kiosk. The work will continue to focus on building and tapping into community connections—social capital—as a tool to support Latino families and the community at large. In addition, based on responses to their community listening sessions, Casa will enhance programming and begin “cross fertilizing” their community engagement programs to enhance the knowledge and skills of their community.

Strategic Fit: Nexus Community Partners is committed to authentic community engagement (CE) as the guiding principle for all of our activities and as a strategy for community members to build and enhance social, physical and personal assets. Our investment in Casa as a trusted community engagement partner has demonstrated great impact to date about how deep engagement in the East Side Latino community builds trust, shares knowledge, increases participation in broader community activities, and builds bridges with organizations and institutions who want to support the Latino community.

East Side Development Company
Purpose: Nexus Funds will be used to deepen and expand ESNDC’s Building Blocks for a Sustainable Future initiative. The goal of this initiative is to change the way ESNDC and the community work together to affect long term change in housing and quality of life issues on the Eastside.

Strategic Fit: A distinguishing feature of Nexus Community Partners is our willingness to support innovative models and programs, often times in their early stages and when no one else will, that build more engaged and powerful communities. Nexus was an early supporter of the Building Blocks for a Sustainable Future program, believing in ESNDC’s vision for the East Side and their ability as an organization to undergo the necessary organizational shifts to make it happen. Building Blocks began as a way for the community to better understand what was happening to their neighborhood in the midst of a foreclosure crisis and has evolved into a multi-faceted, multi-cultural community revitalization initiative. It has also built the capacity of ESNDC and helped them shift their perspective on their work and the role of community in their work.

East Side Family Center
Purpose: Nexus Funds will support the East Side Family Center’s Mortgage Foreclosure Counselors and expand their capacity to provide budgeting services to families in need.

Strategic Fit: In 2008, Nexus Community Partners was an early investor in the East Side Family Center’s Mortgage Foreclosure Counselor position and in 2009 we built further capacity by adding an additional counselor to assist with the growing demand. This support and capacity has allowed the ESFC to assist nearly 100 families, with nearly 50% of those remaining in their homes. Over the course of these two years, the ESFC has seen an obvious gap – budgeting assistance for those who lack the financial understanding and skills to stabilize their finances. Investing in this opportunity supports additional resources, provides proactive foreclosure measures and expands impact. This grant aligns with the East Side Housing Initiatives’ goal to build on existing capacities and fill gaps that exist. There continues to be a strong and growing need for foreclosure prevention services on the East Side and this grant will allow the East Side Family Center to continue providing the services necessary to those in crisis.

Lake Street Council
Purpose: Nexus funds will be used to support Lake Street Council’s Lake Street History Project as a community engagement and asset building project among entrepreneurs and residents in the Midtown section of South Minneapolis and also as part of their larger marketing plan for Lake Street.

Strategic Fit: This grant supports Nexus’ goal of creating effective intersections between community engagement strategies and community development approaches. As we have built the organizational capacity of LSC to improve the Lake Street commercial corridor over the past several years, we have also intentionally requested that LSC continue to connect and maintain ongoing relationships to the surrounding neighborhood’s organizations and their residents. This strategy by Nexus ensures that there will be a greater link between neighborhoods and commercial corridor entities and that these relationships will continue to build and result in greater community impact.

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