Northside Foreclosure Prevention
InCommons Collaboration Challenge
Northside Foreclosure Prevention
In partnership with organizations led by communities of color and immigrant communities, Jewish Community Action is building avenues out of the predatory lending and foreclosure crisis that is having such an impact on communities of color. After examining pre-foreclosure lists and lists of loans that will reset to higher rates, we make personal contact with at-risk homeowners and renters in a dozen neighborhoods in north and south Minneapolis, Brooklyn Park, Brooklyn Center. Hand addressed letters, callers, and doorknockers refer people to foreclosure prevention counseling and incorporate them into our coalition, which will work with lenders on broad loan modifications and other solutions. Through the Northside Community Reinvestment Coalition, staffed by JCA, we are negotiating with lenders to significantly increase access to credit, facilitate loan modifications and pass policy changes in Minnesota that will protect homeowners and renters.
WHO IS THE NORTHSIDE COMMUNITY REINVESTMENT COALITION?
We are a coalition of neighborhood, religious, ethnic and community organizations based in north Minneapolis and the broader Twin Cities metro area. We believe that genuine solutions to the immediate foreclosure crisis must also address the long-term crisis of fair access to credit and financial discrimination. In order to achieve those solutions, we will build a coalition that genuinely engages thousands of residents of the Northside as stewards of their own community wealth and advocates for their own future.
About You
About You
First Name
Vic
Last Name
Rosenthal
Country
United States, MN, Ramsey County
About Your Organization
Organization
Jewish Community Action
Organization Website
Organization Phone
651-632-2184
Organization Address
2375 University Avenue, Suite 150
Organization Country
United States, MN, Ramsey County
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Your Story
Collaboration Title
Northside Foreclosure Prevention
Country your work focuses on
United States, MN, Hennepin County
Describe your locally-based collaboration and the problem it sought to address
In partnership with organizations led by communities of color and immigrant communities, Jewish Community Action is building avenues out of the predatory lending and foreclosure crisis that is having such an impact on communities of color. After examining pre-foreclosure lists and lists of loans that will reset to higher rates, we make personal contact with at-risk homeowners and renters in a dozen neighborhoods in north and south Minneapolis, Brooklyn Park, Brooklyn Center. Hand addressed letters, callers, and doorknockers refer people to foreclosure prevention counseling and incorporate them into our coalition, which will work with lenders on broad loan modifications and other solutions. Through the Northside Community Reinvestment Coalition, staffed by JCA, we are negotiating with lenders to significantly increase access to credit, facilitate loan modifications and pass policy changes in Minnesota that will protect homeowners and renters.
WHO IS THE NORTHSIDE COMMUNITY REINVESTMENT COALITION?
We are a coalition of neighborhood, religious, ethnic and community organizations based in north Minneapolis and the broader Twin Cities metro area. We believe that genuine solutions to the immediate foreclosure crisis must also address the long-term crisis of fair access to credit and financial discrimination. In order to achieve those solutions, we will build a coalition that genuinely engages thousands of residents of the Northside as stewards of their own community wealth and advocates for their own future.
Tell us about the community in which this collaboration took place
Hennepin County and Minneapolis - specific communities are:
Near North
Harrison
Hawthorne
Willard Hay
Jordan
Brooklyn Park
Brooklyn Center
Issue Selector
n/a
Partnership
Who was involved in co-creating or implementing your collaboration (other organizations, leaders, community members, etc.)?
Northside Community Reinvestment Coalition:
MN State Baptist Convention (MNSBC), Minneapolis Urban League (MUL), Hawthorne Neighborhood Council (HNC),
Lao Assistance Center of Minnesota (LACM),
Hmong American Partnership (HAP),
Jordan Area Community Council (JACC),
Harrison Neighborhood Association (HNA),
Northside Residents Redevelopment Council (NRRC),
To what extent does your collaboration involve partnerships that are outside or cross traditional organizational or sector boundaries?
The Northside Community Reinvestment Coalition involves people from different faith traditions, especially Jewish and Christian;, different ethnic backgrounds, including African American, Asian and Latino; and different socio-economic backgrounds, including people facing foreclosure who are low income on the northside partnering with people from suburban Jewish communities who are affluent.
Innovation
What makes your locally-based collaboration innovative and unique?
This collaboration has been recognized as innovative by the National Community Reinvestment Coalition. The work of the Northside Community Reinvestment Coalition and Jewish Community Action has brought together people from across racial, religious and socio-economic differences working for a common purpose. This collaboration is also innovative because it combines service work, doorknocking and referrals for foreclosure prevention counseling with leadership development and community organizing, to advocate for changes in bank and lender policies and changes in state legislative policies.
Through this collaboration, suburban Jewish people have partnered with northside people of color to knock on doors and advocate for changes in lending policies. Individuals facing foreclosure have been helped to refinance or modify their loans and then have joined with NCRC to assist others facing a similar situation. A JCA member with Northside roots assisted an African American woman to obtain foreclosure counseling; this woman joined NCRC and assisted a Latino homeowner who had been targeted by a foreclosure rescue scam agency to connect with the MN Attorney General’s office.
Did you take risks in establishing this collaboration? Explain
There were multiple risks in this alliance-building work since people from different ethnic, racial and religious communities don't have a history of working together. In addition, there is a great risk with individuals affected by the foreclosure crisis serving as leaders in such difficult situations as negotiating loan modifications and policy changes with national banks and lenders.
How did this collaboration differ from the normal way of doing your work?
Jewish Community Action has a history of working as an ally with communities of color and leadership development. While this work is not different from our normal way of doing our work, we believe it is radically different from the normal way that most groups operate. Through this work, people at risk, and those who have not had opportunities to become leaders, advocate for themselve
Impact
How do you know your collaboration has been effective?
Many NCRC leaders are northside residents who have experienced foreclosure and decided to stand up for their neighbors and community. They are powerful advocates for financial justice, and their experiences alone provide insight into the challenges of financial discrimination. NCRC has become a powerful coalition recognized nationally. It has succeeded in gaining meetings with national banks and lenders who are listening to us and considering important changes in lending practices. Legislators from the northside are listening and we expect policy changes to be considered in the coming year that will lead to permanent improvements in access to credit. NCRC has established powerful relationships across racial and religious differences that are committed to each other for long term reform.
What progress or impact has been made?
More than 60 volunteers sent over 2,100 hand addressed letters to residents at risk of foreclosure, and knocked on over 800 doors to reach residents directly, and out of 266 interactions, made 126 direct referrals to foreclosure prevention and tenants’ rights counseling. Some families have been able to avoid foreclosure, negotiations are moving forward with lenders and new leaders have emerged.
Next Steps
How would you go about continuing, expanding, or replicating this collaboration?
NCRC is committed to continuing this work in the coming year to recruit and involve more members of the northside as leaders in the community. We are committed to working with a greater number of diverse organizations in the broader community to increase our power and leverage in working with banks and lenders. In the coming year, the lessons from negotiations with lenders will be applied to developing policy changes at the state legislature and getting them passed.
We have expanded this work into Brooklyn Park and Brooklyn Center, two inner ring suburbs hit hard by the foreclosure crisis. Jewish Community Action is now working with a suburban synagogue to expand this work into other suburban communities who are feeling the impact of the foreclosure crisis. More recently, Jewish Community Action has been meeting with a group of organizations in two communities in St. Paul that have been hit the hardest by the foreclosure crisis. As a result of these meetings, a new St. Paul Fair Lending Coalition is emerging, and is using many of the same organizing approaches and tactics employed successfully in Minneapolis
Describe the current stage of implementation and desired next steps
The current stage of implementation is focused on recruiting and developing new leaders from the northside as partners with members of Jewish Community Action and other communities. We will continue our door-knocking and outreach to make sure that those at risk of foreclosure are referred to counseling and have the opportunity to gain loan modifications.
NCRC and JCA will build a more powerful coalition to include many other groups committed to systemic and sustained changes in the lending and home-buying systems. It is this coalition that will focus on continuing negotiations with national banks and lenders to gain critical reforms, including:
A decision-making contact with the power to quickly grant sustainable, permanent modifications;
A commitment to grant loan modifications to small-scale, responsible landlords;
A pilot project involving the donation or discounted sale of clustered, foreclosed multiplex properties, to be managed by non-profits for evicted families;
The creation of a $300,000 hardship & recovery fund jointly administered by lender and community representatives, available as $5,000-$10,000 grants to qualifying tenants, homeowners and landlords
A commitment to ongoing dialogue about future fair lending commitments.
NCRC will continue to cultivate and involve leaders by sending delegations to the National Community Reinvestment Coalition conferences in Washington, D.C. We’ve raised local funds to send three groups of northside resident leaders and staff to the National Community Reinvestment Coalition conference in Washington DC, and our December 2008 “Road to Recovery” forum with Congressman Keith Ellison drew the largest crowd of any affiliate in that national NCRC day of action.
In addition, NCRC and its partners will focus on developing and passing legislation that will lead to policy and structural changes in how Minnesota regulates and oversees the practices of lenders. This effort will include grassroots organizing involving leaders from NCRC, working together across racial, religious and socio-economic differences with multiple groups to have sufficient power to pass needed policy changes. It is only through these policy changes that permanent and sustainable changes can be secured, and access to credit for communities that have been historically discriminated against can be overcome.
| 138 weeks ago Vic Rosenthal updated this Competition Entry. | |
| 141 weeks ago Vic Rosenthal submitted this idea. |
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