Paving the Path to Homeownership for Housing Choice Voucher Holders
Since the mid-20th century, homeownership has been one of the most important vehicles for building wealth in the United States. According to research from the…
Grants
Featured
Our Grantmaking Strategy
For more than 100 years, The Chicago Community Trust has convened, supported, funded, and accelerated the work of community members and changemakers committed to strengthening the Chicago region. From building up our civic infrastructure to spearheading our response to the Great Recession, the Trust has brought our community together to face pressing challenges and seize our greatest opportunities. Today, that means confronting the racial and ethnic wealth gap.
Explore Our Discretionary Grants
Showing 1921–1928 of 4456 results
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Grant Recipient
Chicago Food Policy Advisory Council NFP
The Metro Chicago Good Food Purchasing Initiative (GFPI) is seeking continued support to deepen our work with institutions to improve their procurement processes, provide support to growers to access these institutional opportunities, and ensure the consistent application of the good food goals of fair wages, sustainable practices, and equitable access.
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Grant Recipient
Chasing23 Youth Empowerment Group
Chasing23 Youth Empowerment Group is an emerging community-based non profit organization working to build respect and unity among young people in Chicago. We were founded in 2016 by Darius Ballinger, a Native Chicagoan who saw a need in his community and chose to fill the need. After three years of operation, impacting the lives of hundreds of young men of color, we are at an exciting inflection point whereby we are ready to systematize our work, build sustainable streams of funding, and ensure our impact can be replicated, scaled and thriving for generations to come.
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Grant Recipient
GREATER SOUTHWEST DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION
Our programs welcome anyone who comes to us for our training and services, no matter the neighborhood, town, or city they are from. However, our target population is business owners and entrepreneurs of Chicago’s Southwest Side neighborhoods which include the following: Chicago Lawn (60629 and 60636), Englewood (60621), West Elsdon (60629 and 60632), West Lawn (60629), West Englewood (60636), New City (60609), Auburn Gresham (60620), and Ashburn (60652), Bronzeville (60653).
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Grant Recipient
Carole Robertson Center for Learning
Funding will be used to further the Carole Robertson Center for Learning's work to implement the organization’s racial equity approach. We are looking to have a way to speak about and work toward racial equity and social justice through our policies and practices with children, families and each other. In order to do that we acknowledge that there is need for a consistent understanding of racial equity and social justice, absent this there is no concrete mechanism for advancing our goals beyond the discreet activities we have already achieved.
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Grant Recipient
TREND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION
Led by a group of established Chicago real estate professionals committed to equitable development and inclusive growth, CEMDI aims to source and build a pipeline of community-focused developers from African American, Latinx and other minority communities to participate in commercial real estate development projects city-wide. Following a year of exploratory research, planning and organizing and an initial year of conceptualizing and beginning to pilot its initial programs, CEMDI will use the requested grant funds to expand and deliver a 2nd year of programming. The three-pronged approach includes: 1. CEMDI Accelerator incorporates all six of CEMDI’s strategies by leveraging the relationships and expertise of the CEMDI principals. The CEMDI Accelerator is not a cohort-based program, but instead offers one-on-one advice and coaching to five emerging developers selected each year. Chicago TREND will work closely with each emerging developer to understand their business and identify a customized path to success. CEMDI principals will help emerging developers advance a new deal, structure a joint venture partnership, secure patient capital, grow their development and professional services team, etc. By meeting high-potential emerging developers where they are and providing resources, connections and expertise, CEMDI will help them grow their business to the next level. Due to historic disinvestment and restrictions over generations in minority communities, fewer emerging entrepreneurs have access to mentors with strong industry relationships, experience and generational wealth. 2. Developer Roundtable will foster relationship-building and establish a "voice" for minority developers. The CEMDI principals will engage up to ten veteran, non-minority developers and up to ten minority, emerging developers to participate in the Developer Roundtable. One strategic way for an emerging firm to grow is to enter into a joint venture partnership with an experienced firm. This allows the emerging developer to bring their skills and experience to the project as a partner, gain additional capacity and expertise, and share responsibility for both the profits and losses that a project generates. By securing a seat at the table, building credit, reputation and track record, emerging developers gain access and the experience needed to take on larger projects. The Developer Roundtable advances the strategy of connecting emerging developers to potential joint venture partners to provide access to development opportunities and mentorship. The roundtable will create a venue for C-suite development professionals to build a sense of community and to establish relationships between veteran and emerging developers -- setting the stage for future partnerships, informal mentorship opportunities and mutually beneficial business relationships. 3. CEMDI Connects will strengthen the broader commercial real estate ecosystem by hosting up to four events/workshops each year, including the annual CEMDI Summit. For developers to scale and grow, they need relationships, connections and access to professional service firms to grow their development team. Having strong relationships provides opportunities for both formal and informal mentorship and provides a launch pad for business relationships to grow over time. CEMDI Connects will expand the professional networks of commercial real estate professionals of color. CEMDI Connects primarily advances two strategies: (a) connecting emerging developers to professional service firms to build their capacity with their development teams and back-office infrastructure and (b) connecting emerging developers to financial resources for formal educational and other professional development programs. CEMDI Connects will do this by engaging, supporting and adding capacity to the commercial real estate ecosystem for minority developers in Chicago. Specific programs are anticipated to include a series of networking, firm showcases and community workshop events, and online resources. This programming will provide opportunities for minority professionals in real estate-related fields (e.g., architecture, accounting, engineering, finance, construction, etc.) to build their networks, put together development teams and broaden their professional experience.
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Grant Recipient
Better Government Association, Inc.
In 2020, through a Media Maker grant, The Chicago Community Trust made a high-impact investment in the Better Government Association’s ability to deepen its coverage of underserved and minority neighborhoods. This funding allowed us to hire a Manager of Partnerships and Local Content who forged partnerships and reporting relationships with news organizations and residents in under-resourced neighborhoods in the West and South Sides of Chicago. This role focuses on engaging with partners and audiences with innovative tools, storytelling and programming that promotes community understanding of, and activation around, critical civic issues and the impact of government on their lives. The Trust’s investment in the MPLC position has allowed the BGA to establish authentic connections with underserved communities across Chicago and raise the voices of residents that often go unheard. Led by Olivia Obineme, Manager of Partnerships and Local Content, the BGA’s community engagement work in the last year included a virtual discussion with former Cabrini-Green residents to discuss the city’s broken promises in its Plan for Transformation; a collaborative effort with the Village Free Press, Austin Weekly and Catchlight to expose barriers faced by Black-owned businesses on the South and West Sides in seeking Paycheck Protection Program funding; a follow-up to publication of “The Circuit,” an unparalleled collaboration with Injustice Watch to collect Cook County Courts data, which has led to the compilation of stories from 60 community members about their interactions with the courts. And more than 110 residents have responded to an MPLC community query about how implementation of illegal drug laws affects their lives. We know that building authentic, community relationships is a critical part of ensuring our public service journalism is serving the people who need it most. The MPLC role has allowed the BGA to move beyond transactional relationships and cultivate partnerships with smaller newsrooms that have their fingers on the pulse of local communities across Chicago, and these connections have expanded audience and reach for our partners. As just one example, Austin Weekly News editor and Village Free Press founding publisher Michael Romain indicated that it was direct outreach from the MPLC that led to a partnership with the BGA, noting that the BGA’s visible efforts to connect directly with the communities the BGA covers and serves was a key factor in his decision to collaborate with the BGA. With continued investment from the Trust, the BGA will strengthen and grow our community partnerships. Our growth in the immediate future, thanks to increased funding from the Trust and others, will enhance the BGA’s storytelling and help us involve our local partners more deeply in news gathering, audience outreach, community engagement and participation in a thriving nonprofit news ecosystem. We will reach more deeply and authentically into underserved communities, work with partners to localize reporting for stories and share them more broadly, and host events that highlight the impact of government's actions and inactions on communities–informing people and empowering them with facts that hold government accountable and ultimately improve their lives.
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Grant Recipient
The Galley Chicago LLC
Request for pre-development funds for project to convert vacant bank building into a culinary studio offering Chef-led instruction, Hands on Cooking/Baking Workshops and Bootcamps, Cooking Demonstrations, Health and Wellness Workshops - Food is Medicine among others, event space rental and private dining services.
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Grant Recipient
California Institute of Technology