Strong City Baltimore
Building and strengthening neighborhoods and people
Programs and results
What we aim to solve
Baltimore is at a critical juncture. Many neighborhoods continue to suffer from population loss and high vacancy rates, as well as overarching issues such as city-wide education budget cuts and complex, deep-seated racial disparities.
Neighborhoods with a history of low civic engagement, no connections to anchor institutions, and a lack of public and private investment have the highest risk for remaining distressed.
We believe there are no quick fixes for Baltimore's challenges. Strong City utilizes a holistic model of collaborative community building while increasing individual's capacities to address local challenges. Our core work includes leveraging key neighborhood assets and addressing challenges: increasing the number of engaged residents; addressing blighted and vacant properties; supporting and improving schools as well as adult learners; promoting investment and home-ownership and advocating for policies and funding that improve quality of life.
Our programs
What are the organization's current programs, how do they measure success, and who do the programs serve?
Neighborhood Programs
Strong City Baltimore works to reinforce the pillars of vibrant urban living: desirable and diverse housing stock, quality public schools, a robust and educated workforce, and above all else, a deep sense of civic engagement. Much like the neighborhoods we serve, our programs are interconnected and bolster our holistic approach to fulfilling our mission.
Our programs include Housing Upgrades to Benefit Seniors, Community Organizing, Targeted Neighborhood Investment, Healthy Neighborhoods Marketing, and Vacant Housing Reduction, as well as Community Schools Programming at Barclay Elementary/Middle, Govans Elementary, and Margaret Brent Elementary/Middle Schools.
We focus in lower income and middle market neighborhoods to improve the overall quality of life in Baltimore. Our strategies to strengthen these neighborhoods include improving public schools, facilitating private and public investment in neighborhoods and commercial corridors, and developing neighborhood leadership.
Adult Learning Center
When adults learn to read and write, it changes their lives.
For 28 years, Strong City’s Adult Learning Center (ALC), along with its off-site locations, has provided high-quality, learner-centered classes in Adult Basic Education (ABE), GED Preparation, English Language Acquisition (ELA), and citizenship preparation, all at no cost to the learner. In 2017, 82% of ABE learners and 79% of ELA Learners increased their post-test scores showing their progression of readiness.
The ALC does more than teach learners - our programs empower learners to become college and career ready. Our learners can manage bank accounts, communicate effectively with their children’s teachers, and independently apply for jobs and post-secondary education opportunities.
In a city where over 100,000 adults do not have a high school diploma and 52,000 residents speak another language at home, the ALC is filling an urgent need to provide skills for learners to succeed in work and life.
The 29th Street Community Center
Strong City Baltimore has been operating The 29th Street Community Center since 2011, when it was slated to be closed. We believe this space is an essential cornerstone of the community.
When Strong City took over management of the building in 2011, we led the refurbishment and operations of the Center, all without the support of Baltimore City. In our first four years, we’ve served over 1,400 residents of all ages through over 80 enrichment programs, more than 95 community events, and regular community association meetings
Since its rebirth, the Center has offered over 65 unique and diverse programs, dozens of community-strengthening events, and essential public services to thousands of community residents of all ages and socio-economic backgrounds. Over 400 community residents utilize the Center every week. Each summer, the Center is a site for summer camps and employs young adults through Baltimore City's YouthWorks Program.
Non-Profit Business Services
Establishing infrastructure that facilitates organizations with low-barrier access to capital and the ability to efficiently scale remains one of the most significant challenges for small nonprofits for two significant reasons. Projects need a method to access capital startup capital from foundations and donors, and programs do not innately develop infrastructure capacity commensurate with program growth.
To address these needs in the non-profit community in Baltimore, Strong City developed our Non-Profit Business Services program, which provides back office services including fiscal sponsorship to nearly 100 small- and mid-sized projects in and around Baltimore.
Since launching the NPBS program in 2011, we have grown from 35 fiscally sponsored projects with $450k in assets to 96 fiscally sponsored projects with $7.3 million in assets at the end of our fiscal year 2016. This program leverages Strong City’s in-house administrative expertise and capacity to support projects engaged in charitable and community-oriented activities – leaving them with more time and energy to pursue their missions.
AmeriCorps VISTA
Each year, Strong City develops and supports nonprofit and community leaders who are passionate about service and community development.
Strong City Baltimore is proud to sponsor the largest AmeriCorps VISTA intermediary program in Maryland. We believe that AmeriCorps VISTA projects are integral to positive community empowerment. We leverage our resources and expertise to support and build the capacity of Maryland’s changemakers by offering recruitment, project development, administrative, and supervisory support.
Members serve for 365 days as full-time volunteers at a nonprofit organization, religious organization, or government agency. They work to eradicate poverty by fighting illiteracy, improving health services, strengthening community groups, and much more. Strong City-sponsored AmeriCorps VISTA members receive a solid foundation of skills they can use as a springboard for careers in government, nonprofits, education, and beyond.
The Strong City VISTA Cohort implements sustainable solutions and expands the impact of education, economic opportunity, and healthy futures projects in Baltimore City as well as Montgomery, Prince George’s, Washington, and Howard counties. We continue to seek out partners across Maryland to offer National Service opportunities and placements.
Community Wealth Building
In January 2016, we launched our Community Wealth Building initiative, which builds off of and strengthens our neighborhood work by helping nurture quality, people-centered job opportunities and a vibrant local economy centered around strong, connected neighborhood enterprises.
While community wealth building models are common in many cities across the U.S. and have a proven track record of success for creating quality jobs in some of the most distressed neighborhoods across the nation, such inclusive, sustainable models are still relatively rare in Baltimore. However, with the extreme inequities between Baltimore neighborhoods, it is clear new approaches to economic and community development are sorely needed. This initiative will address this urgent need by educating Baltimoreans about these critically important strategies/models while catalyzing on-the-ground efforts to build community wealth.
Where we work
External reviews
Our results
How does this organization measure their results? It's a hard question but an important one.
Number of community events or trainings held and attendance
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Related Program
Neighborhood Programs
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Increasing
Context Notes
Strong City holds an annual Neighborhood Institute for community leaders and residents, as well as various neighborhood leadership training sessions.
Number of adults who received literacy services
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Related Program
Adult Learning Center
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Increasing
Context Notes
The Adult Learning Center provides high-quality, learner-centered instruction to help Baltimore residents become career and college ready.
Number of low-income families housed in affordable, well-maintained units as a result of the nonprofit's efforts
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Related Program
Neighborhood Programs
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Increasing
Context Notes
Strong City is an ally for local communities who need help to combat vacant and problem properties. We coordinate abatement and re-occupation of problem properties in our targeted neighborhoods.
Number of fiscal sponsorship dollars distributed
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Related Program
Non-Profit Business Services
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Increasing
Context Notes
Strong City’s in-house administrative expertise and capacity supports projects engaged in charitable and community-oriented activities –leaving them with more time and energy to pursue their missions.
Goals & Strategy
Learn about the organization's key goals, strategies, capabilities, and progress.
Charting impact
Four powerful questions that require reflection about what really matters - results.
What is the organization aiming to accomplish?
Strong City serves all of Baltimore City, and while we've grown and evolved over our 48 years, we remain bound to the core values upon which we were founded: that organized neighborhoods can tap into the energies and gifts of their residents to build collective power – power that can be used to build up assets, address problems, hold government accountable and create great places to live. We know that organized action is crucial to building strong communities.
Our core belief is that neighborhood residents are foundational to local change. We know that to develop neighborhood capacity, we must harness the energy of local people. This begins with listening to and identifying collective issues while working closely with people over time to develop real-world solutions.
Strong City employs a place-based community building strategy – a flexible model that can adapt to locations, needs and issues, developing organically to create sustainable community change. Our work in neighborhoods always starts with residents who want to make a change and a community asking for assistance. Early work involves identifying assets and formal institutions that could have a positive impact over time, including: civic organizations, relevant city agencies, elected officials, schools, businesses, nonprofits and anchor institutions like universities and places of worship. A place-based strategy builds on these existing assets. Even the most distressed neighborhoods have assets: passionate, committed people, relationships and institutions like schools, churches, businesses.
Strong City Baltimore aims to achieve our goals of making Baltimore a better city for all. Our work, and breadth of activities, is ambitious, but intentionally so, as the breadth of interconnected problems that the city and its citizens face are vast and have been created by decades of disinvestment. Our holistic model of community development empowers and serves those who seek to improve their lives, blocks, communities, and city.
What are the organization's key strategies for making this happen?
Strong City's model of community development is built on the foundation that neighborhood improvement is a multi-faceted task requiring a long-term approach. This praxis incorporates elements of neighborhood revitalization, civic capacity building, and economic development. We view the interconnectivity of our various programs as the necessarily comprehensive method required for true community development.
Experience has shown us that lasting change is achieved by supporting neighborhood leaders, fostering civic engagement, and building community. One of our priorities is always housing revitalization, with an emphasis on reducing vacancies. When Strong City began its targeted code enforcement in 2008, there were more than 800 vacant buildings in our focus area; by the end of 2016, there were fewer than 340. Since 2007, this work has generated more than $32 million in private investment.
Strong City's site-based community school coordinators support teachers, administrators and parents to augment services, identify resources, and help schools become neighborhood hubs. Our relentless advocacy work resulted in a brand-new Waverly Elementary/Middle School building, and as a founding member and fiscal sponsor of the Baltimore Education Coalition, we helped turn the dream of a $1 billion state investment in city public schools into a reality.
Strong City's programs and partnerships increase individuals' capacity to succeed. Our Adult Learning Center empowers adult learners to become college and career ready through adult basic education and ESOL classes. Strong City's partnership with the Healthy Neighborhoods program helps increase homeownership with access to low-interest loans and incentives. The 29th Street Community Center, which had been closed by the city in 2011, was reopened by Strong City in 2013 and is thriving, with 450 adults and children enrolled weekly in its programs – 70 percent of which are led by community residents.
As the fiscal sponsor for over 100 local organizations, Strong City partners with change-makers throughout the city, from small groups like Friends of Stony Run to complex social enterprises such as Impact Hub in Station North and Baltimore Corps. As the largest sponsor of AmeriCorps VISTA members in Maryland, Strong City's influence extends to dozens more nonprofits and government agencies.
What are the organization's capabilities for doing this?
Since its inception, Strong City has been a catalyst, resource, incubator, facilitator, coalition-builder, and innovator for Baltimore. Over the past 48 years, we have forged many successful partnerships, expanded the services we provide, and widened our geographical range. We have successfully spearheaded neighborhood revitalization and have led significant projects such as the restoration of Wyman Park, coordinated vast improvements in the Barclay and Harwood neighborhoods, and reduced over half of blighted and vacant properties in our targeted neighborhoods.
We also work with numerous organizations in order to catalyze sustainable change. A few of our most significant current partnerships are:
• York Road Partnership (YRP): Strong City is a leader of an umbrella group uniting people across a historic race and class divide. Amongst other achievements, the YRP has successfully removed five problem liquor establishments, established the Govanstown Farmer's Market, and coordinated the restoration of 40 vacant homes.
• Homewood Community Partnership Initiative and Central Baltimore Partnership: Key partners in anchor institution strategy to revitalize Central Baltimore that have supported public education by investing over $1 million in physical improvements, introducing STEM/Engineering and Arts Integration focuses at Barclay and Margaret Brent elementary and middle schools, and creating the 29th Street Community Center.
• Baltimore Education Coalition: 20 plus member coalition for education advocacy that has won $1 Billion towards school construction and stopped $125 million in budget cuts.
All of our initiatives rely on the collaborative efforts of a group of organizations, each with their own strengths – and, as a participant in these leadership roles, Strong City is able to help leverage the strengths of each partner organization, as well as preserve the priorities and goals of impacted communities, whether by bringing community members into conversations, or by facilitating deeper thinking among separate stakeholder groups.
What have they accomplished so far and what's next?
Over our 48 years of existence, Strong City Baltimore have helped create immense change in our targeted neighborhoods. A few examples of these accomplishments are:
Vacant housing: The 400 block of Whitridge Avenue was one of the most troubled areas of Harwood, with over half of its houses abandoned, when Strong City began our strategic code enforcement work in 2008. By 2014, the number of vacants in Harwood had dropped from about 190 to 45 – a reduction of more than 75 percent, heralding the renewal of a once-stable community. Whitridge Row itself has become a jewel of Harwood; the street has just a handful of vacants, and a dozen beautifully refurbished homes are now being marketed at affordable prices, thanks to an innovative financing strategy pioneered by Strong City with a grant we won from the state.
Community Center: In 2011, the city closed the poorly maintained and underutilized Barclay Recreation Center, depriving nearby neighborhoods of a key asset. Community leaders asked Strong City to step in, and in 2013 the building was reopened as the 29th Street Community Center. Today, several hundred adults and children benefit each week from the center's low-cost, high-quality recreational, educational, and social programming – with most classes led by community members.
Neighborhood organizing: Over a decade ago, the Remington neighborhood was plagued by drugs, crime, and disinvestment when residents asked for Strong City's help. Using our time-tested community organizing techniques, we helped get a vigorous new neighborhood association off the ground, rallying residents, churches, schools, and businesses to dream a new future for the community they love. Today, Remington is one of the most desirable neighborhoods in Baltimore, drawing residents to upgraded housing and incubating new businesses.
Strength through partnership: Partnerships and coalitions are key to our success. Strong City is a founding member of the Baltimore Education Coalition, which we also support as a nonprofit business client. Our advocacy with the BEC led directly to the approval of the $1 billion, 21st Century Schools construction and renovation plan, which will transform Baltimore's educational landscape in the coming years by modernizing dozens of city school buildings.
Citywide impact: Though our historical roots are in north-central Baltimore, Strong City's reach has been citywide for many years now through such programs as our Adult Learning Center, AmeriCorps VISTA, and annual Neighborhood Institute.
As Strong City looks towards the future, we aim to continue supporting transformative and sustainable change across Baltimore City.
Financials
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Operations
The people, governance practices, and partners that make the organization tick.
Connect with nonprofit leaders
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Connect with nonprofit leaders
SubscribeBuild relationships with key people who manage and lead nonprofit organizations with GuideStar Pro. Try a low commitment monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights? Learn More about GuideStar Pro.
Strong City Baltimore
Board of directorsas of 03/03/2020
Georgia Smith
University Baptist Church
Term: 2013 - 2019
Michael Arnst
Blaustein Philanthropic Group
Ashley Short
Venable LLP
Andrew Joliet
M&T Bank
Ethan Bauman
National Security Agency
Todd Canter
LaSalle Investment Management
Joseph Carpenter
Brown Advisory
Ana Castro
JRS Architects
Marilyn Gould
Gensler
Jennifer Mielke
Johns Hopkins University
Brett Noll
Security Plus Federal Credit Union
Erin O'Keefe
Loyola University
Mark Pollak
Ballard Spahr LLP
Norman Sensinger
Johns Eastern Company
Phil Spevak
Johns Hopkins University
Thiru Vignarajah
DLA Piper
Anwar Young
Young Law Group, LLC
Janyelle Thomas
Johns Hopkins University