The Gap - A Shortage of Affordable Homes


No State Has an Adequate Supply of Affordable Rental Housing for the Lowest-Income Renters

Global Greater Boston: Immigrants in a Changing Region


For as long as it’s been a city, immigrants have been central to Boston’s identity. For this new report Boston Indicators partnered with Immigration Research Initiative to analyze who makes up immigrant communities in Greater Boston, quantify what they contribute to our regional economy, and detail the immigration pathways they take to get here.

Advocates' Guide 2024!


Every year, the National Low Income Housing Coalition publishes the Advocates’ Guide to educate advocates of all kinds about the programs and policies that make housing affordable to low-income people across America.

Compare Project Management Software


Search and select project management software to build your own comparison and see which provider best fits your requirements.

Boston Builds Credit

Boston Builds Credit
Here, you’ll find free and low-cost resources to help Boston and area residents understand how credit works and learn how to build, protect and improve your credit scores. With a trusted network of partners working with the City of Boston and United Way of Massachusetts Bay & Merrimack Valley, our team can put you in contact with a trained financial coach and financial wellness workshops.

Dirty Data Cost Calculator

Association Trends
Download this whitepaper and learn how to: Calculate how much dirty data is currently costing your association, and how much it will continue costing as time passes without clean-up. Quantify this cost so you are able to communicate the importance of data hygiene to your boss, board, and/or stakeholders.

Turning Towards Each Other: A Conflict Workbook

Jovida Ross and Weyam Ghadbian
The exercises in this workbook are offered as a way to bring love into the hard parts of our relationships. Of course, when we’re in the middle of a tense situation, it may not feel like love. It can be helpful to remember that there are always multiple truths present in a conflict: We each experience a situation differently, and interpret what is going on from a different vantage point. Making space for our feelings and experiences to be acknowledged can help us surface deeper insights hidden in the tension and uncover new solutions.

Getting Capital to Small Businesses in Low-Income Communities

The Aspen Institute
Heeding the call for greater race and gender equity, policymakers, donors, and investors want to uplift small businesses in underserved communities. But boosting access to capital for business owners of color is easier said than done. In this video, we identify the importance of microloans in meeting firms owned by people of color where they are in terms of their capital needs. And we highlight the work of community development financial institutions (CDFIs) in serving this vital role. Members of the Aspen Institute’s Microfinance Impact Collaborative, for example, issued over 8,300 loans in 2018, 75% of which were to entrepreneurs of color.

COVID-19 Reopening Guide for Small Businesses

Chamber of Commerce
This guide will cover all that business owners need to know about reopening and navigating current government requirements.

Move The Money: Practices and Values for Funding Social Movements

Building Movement Project
A set of resources geared towards grantmaking institutions eager to expand and deepen their support of organizations, networks, and leaders involved with social change movements.

Delivering Credit to Entrepreneurs of Color Impacted by COVID-19: Why Community Financial Institutions Are Essential

The Aspen Institute
Prior to the global pandemic, the relatively high small business start and ownership rates among entrepreneurs of color were a bright spot in a period of declining US entrepreneurship. But small businesses have endured some of the hardest stresses of the pandemic, as forced closures and physical distancing have decimated earnings for restaurants, salons, childcare centers, and other services we all rely on. Businesses owned by entrepreneurs of color have been particularly impacted by declining revenues, and despite government efforts to get money into people’s hands, many small businesses have not received the support they need. This is partly a problem with the delivery systems used: programs that flow through banks miss those that have historically been underserved. Fortunately, there are lenders who serve these businesses and communities: Community Development Financial Institutions. CDFIs are mission-driven lenders that serve the parts of America that too often get left behind, inc

Beyond the Board Statement: How Can Boards Join the Movement for Racial Justice? (Part Two)

Jeanne Bell & Nonprofit Quarterly
In this second part of a two-part series, nationally renowned board and equity consultants Vernetta Walker and Robin Stacia answer participants’ questions about how to transform a board so it embraces a racial equity agenda, In this session, you’ll find many practical examples of ways to approach the work, discussions of the barriers to change, and tools to help organize and ground racial justice in your organizational mission. Stacia and Walker bring an interactive approach that is deeply insightful, grounded in both research and practice, and unrelentingly focused on creating a different and more racially just future.

BoardSource Racial Equity Tools Glossary

BoardSource
Racial Equity Tools has created a glossary of terms to create a shared understanding of words to enhance the way we talk about race. Language is an essential tool in racial equity work, and the terms we use have evolved as this work has developed. Having a common language allows us to better engage, discuss, and reflect on these important issues together. Terms in the glossary include: Implicit bias, Institutional racism, Microaggression, Restorative justice

Cambridge College Resource Library for Business Development Program

Cambridge College
The Business Resource Library connects Consultants, Technical Assistance Providers and students to a variety of learning tools, including sample documents and industry trend topics. This library can quickly provide comprehensive information you may need to assist small businesses during their start-up, stabilization and growth phases. These materials can be downloaded from the links below. This library was built with the collaboration of Massachusetts Growth Capital Corporation (MGCC), Mel King Institute, Lawyers for Civil Rights, and Technical Assistance providers.

Storytelling Toolkit: Lessons Learned from NHT's "Where Will We Live"

National Housing Trust
This toolkit is a guide for advocates to replicate the National Housing Trust’s efforts and successfully employ digital, visual and audio storytelling strategies within their advocacy tactics.

Opportunity360 Community Dashboard

Enterprise
Opportunity360 Community Dashboards provide the information necessary to determine where action is most needed and where established programs and policies have been most successful in any neighborhood in the country. These dashboards now allow data comparison for up to three census tracts, anywhere in the US. In the free Opportunity360 Community Dashboards, you will find over 150 indicators from 27 sources.

Public Policy Resources

BestColleges.com
This guide includes links to free public policy online resources that will help one get a better sense of the entire field.

Public Policy Career Outlook

BestColleges.com
This guide provides you with in-depth information on degree planning including program structures, concentrations, and skill development and application for a Public Policy career.

Earning a Public Policy Master’s Degree

BestColleges.com
This resource will help you learn about the common Master's in Public Policy admission requirements, coursework, and jobs available for graduates.

Vision, Values, and Voice: A Communications Toolkit

The Opportunity Agenda
This toolkit focuses on the broader goal of identifying universal themes and values that tie together a range of issues.

Rights for Renters Messaging

Public Will Initiative with Topos
This tool reiterates focusing on the positives instead of the negatives when it comes to messaging. Even though the series is called Rights for Renters, it isn’t actually limited to renter issue areas—such as the Critiquing Without Undermining Government brief.

A Progressive’s Style Guide

Hanna Thomas (SumOfUs.org); Anna Hirsch (ActivistEditor.com)
A Progressive’s Style Guide is explicitly multi-voiced and is created with the following commitments. 1) We combat discriminatory language. 2) We seek advice or more information when we’re unsure. 3) When writing, speaking, or using images, we aim to use examples that reflect a broad range of identities and perspectives.

55 Competency-Based Ideas for Professional Development

The Bridgespan Group
This extensive list of 55 practical on-the-job learning opportunities will help you build customized development plans for your direct reports.

Massachusetts Small Business Loan Data Project

Massachusetts Community & Banking Council (MCBC)
The Massachusetts Community & Banking Council (the MCBC) has sponsored an annual report on small business lending trends in Massachusetts since 1998. In the Spring of 2019, MCBC launched a new online platform – the Massachusetts Small Business Loan Data Project – that serves as a companion to the most recent report, Small Business Lending in Massachusetts 2008-2017, authored by BankMaps. The Massachusetts Small Business Loan Data Project provides an online data service with interactive access to maps and charts from six (6) national databases related to the subject of small business lending in Massachusetts.

DataTown

Massachusetts Housing Partnership's Center for Housing Data
The site compiles community-level information from various data sources for all 351 Massachusetts cities and towns, and visualizes that data in graphics and charts so it's easy to understand, print out and bring to a community discussion.

The National Equity Research Database, Boston Edition

Brandeis Institute for Child, Youth and Family Policy
This is a database of 286 socio-economic indicators on a wide range of subjects, including demography, education, employment, health, housing, earnings and ancestry covering the Boston metropolitan area.

Building Blocks: Connecting People, Places and Policies

Enterprise Community Partners
A podcast for thought-provoking conversations about the current issues, trends, ideas and big questions facing the affordable housing and community development field in the United States.

MASSCAP Trainings: Recorded Webinars

MASSCAP
This resource contains all the past recorded webinars from MASSCAP (Understanding Immigrant Rights, Community Action Impact, Succession Planning, and More!)

Access: A Community Development Podcast

Federal Reserve System
Access is a new podcast from the Community Development departments of the Federal Reserve System. Each episode highlights a successful model or program within the four focus areas of our work: people, place, policy and practice, and small business.

Budget Resources

Mass Budget
Shortly after each major state budget release, MassBudget produce a written Budget Monitor that analyzes major proposals across a range of key areas (e.g. education, transportation, health care, revenue).

Inclusive, Local Sourcing: Purchasing for People and Place

Democracy Collaborative
This toolkit provides hospital and health system leaders with the tools they need to harness their everyday business operations to improve community health through procurement and purchasing focused on locally-owned businesses.

Tools for Cultivating and Connecting Leaders

Living Cities
A well curated toolkit to support effective and adaptive leadership

Jargon Buster- Build Healthy Places Network

Build Healthy Places Network
Tool demystifies community development and public health jargon terms for those working with peers in other sectors

Pedestrian Infrastructure: Strategies for improving pedestrian safety through low-cost traffic calming

WalkBoston
Tool provides examples of low-cost measures to calm traffic and enhance safety on municipal streets and state roads

Shared Ownership Toolkit

Business Alliance for Local Living Economies (BALLE)
Explore case studies, videos and resources on how to create a shared ownership business enterprise

Resources from the Massachusetts Community and Banking Council

Massachusetts Community and Banking Council
Explore MCBC's compendium of resources on their new website intended for boosting the availability of credit and financial services in low-income communities

Sample CDC Policies and Procedures

Local Initiatives Support Corporation
Sample guide outlines Community Development Corporation organizational policies and procedures in line with requirements for federal funding

Pro Bono Analytics for Non-Profit Organizations

INFORMS
Learn about the pro-bono analytics software that nonprofit organizations can use to analyze data

All in Cities Initiative

PolicyLink
Toolkit includes policy ideas, data and assistance to advance racial economic inclusion and equitable growth

Community Resources for Boards

BoardSource
Set of guides on everything for nonprofit boards, from how to take minutes to financial and fundraising issues.