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WHITE HOUSE COUNCIL ON 

STRONG CITIES, STRONG COMMUNITIES 

Final Report

January 2017
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CONTENTS

Contents....................................................................................................................................1

Welcome from the Executive and Deputy Directors.................................................................2

Overview of Strong Cities, Strong Communities (SC2)..............................................................3

SC2 Background and Approach for Supporting Communities ..............................................3

(1) SC2 Deployed Federal Community Solutions Teams.......................................................3

(2) SC2 National Resource Network ......................................................................................3

(3) SC2 Fellows and AmeriCorps VISTA Members.................................................................4

(4) SC2 Economic Visioning Challenge ..................................................................................4

The Value Added: What SC2 Brings to the Table ......................................................................5

1. A Better Federal Partner ...................................................................................................6

Spotlight on the National Endowment for the Arts as a Better Federal Partner..................8

2. The Power of Convening and Connecting .........................................................................9

Spotlight on Collaboration with the Federal Reserve System.............................................11

3. Enhanced Capacity for Constrained Local Governments................................................13

4. Equipping Cities with Information, Tools, and Data to Inform Decision-Making............16

Technical Assistance Clearinghouse and Resource Library.................................................16

Spotlight on Using Data to Advance Local Priorities...........................................................16

Municipal Health Data for American Cities Pilot.................................................................17

Mapping for Impact.............................................................................................................18

311 for Cities .......................................................................................................................18

Looking Ahead.........................................................................................................................20
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WELCOME FROM THE EXECUTIVE AND DEPUTY DIRECTORS

Dear readers of our final SC2 report,

Whether you’re one of our active local or federal stakeholders working in or with one of the 

Strong Cities, Strong Communities (SC2) communities, someone interested in federal-local 

partnerships, or a member of the American public curious about this initiative and the use of 

taxpayer dollars, we welcome you and thank you for your time on behalf of the entire SC2 

team. If you are new to SC2, the first section of the report provides an overview of the 

initiative with its mission and work components. When all of SC2’s work concludes by 

summer 2017, this initiative will have partnered with more than 70 diverse cities spread 

across our great nation to move the needle on economic development challenges and 

ultimately coordinate taxpayer dollars more efficiently and effectively. 

Each SC2 city shares a common narrative. Despite having faced tremendous economic and 

demographic challenges for the last few decades, local leaders and stakeholders have a 

strong vision for change and seek a better federal partner. This is the core of SC2—how the 

federal government can collaborate and coordinate across federal agencies, partner with 

states and localities, coordinate resources, and use evidence-based data to support a 

community’s vision and serve as a better, more responsive federal partner. It may seem 

intuitive, but this is an approach that has real efficacy. Through SC2’s experiences over the 

last five years, the testimonials of many mayors and local stakeholders of all political stripes, 

and external evaluations, we know that this approach works and makes common sense and 

business sense. This team has taken lessons learned from SC2 and worked with our federal 

agency partners to formalize this approach by helping to design an interagency Community 

Solutions Council. This Council offers a framework that captures key lessons learned from 

stakeholders for the next President to continue this “listening-based” approach to better 

federal coordination and partnership with communities. 

We would also like to acknowledge the leadership and contributions of so many who have 

made our work a success: all of the local leaders, city staff, and partners in the cities we work 

with who have the vision and desire to bring positive change to their communities; our SC2 cochairs HUD Secretary Julián Castro and Domestic Policy Director Cecilia Muñoz; former SC2 

Executive Director Mark Linton and Deputies Kate Reynolds and Tricia Kerney-Willis; all the 

federal partners on the SC2 Council who run through the bureaucratic red tape and connect 

the dots; all SC2 team leads and federal team members who do the hard work on the ground in 

the cities we serve; all the federal staff who have served on the SC2 HQ team to keep 

operations running smoothly; the SC2 National Resource Network team, led by David 

Eichenthal, that traveled to so many cities to lend their expertise; former SC2 co-chair, OMB 

Director Shaun Donovan, and two former appointees instrumental to the creation of SC2, Erika 

Poethig and Derek Douglas; and to our interns who helped with this report and many other 

projects. Thank you for your time and interest in this important work.

Best regards,

Patrick Pontius, Executive Director, and Kate Dykgraaf, Deputy Director
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OVERVIEW OF STRONG CITIES, STRONG COMMUNITIES (SC2)

This overview provides a high level summary of SC2 and its four primary work streams. For 

more information on our work beyond content in this report, please visit the SC2 website.

SC2 Background and Approach for Supporting Communities

In 2012, President Obama established the White House Council on Strong Cities, Strong 

Communities (SC2) as an innovative approach for supporting cities experiencing population 

and job loss, persistent poverty, capacity constraints, and similar challenges in an era of ever 

dwindling resources. Through SC2, 19 federal agencies work together in partnership with 

committed city leaders as they implement locally-driven economic visions. SC2 seeks to 

support each of its cities by increasing federal-local collaboration and improving how the 

federal government invests in and delivers technical assistance to advance locally-driven 

economic development and job creation goals. SC2 consists of four components and will 

ultimately work with more than 70 cities via:

1. SC2 Deployed Federal Community Solutions Teams

2. SC2 National Resource Network

3. SC2 Fellows and AmeriCorps VISTA Members

4. SC2 Economic Visioning Challenge

(1) SC2 Deployed Federal 

Community Solutions Teams

In this 14-city pilot, a career civil servant 

from the federal government relocated 

and embedded in a mayor’s office to 

serve for two years and coordinate a 

federal, interagency SC2 Community 

Solutions team to support the city’s 

vision. These federal SC2 teams

functioned as a nimble, solutionsoriented partner, cutting through federal 

red tape and leveraging resources to 

advance the city’s economic development 

goals. SC2 launched two cohorts with

deployed teams working in: Brownsville, 

TX; Macon-Bibb County, GA; Flint, MI; 

Rockford, IL; Gary, IN; Rocky Mount, NC; 

St. Louis, MO; Youngstown, OH; Detroit, 

MI; Memphis, TN; Chester, PA; New 

Orleans, LA; Fresno, CA; and Cleveland, 

OH. At the time of publication, all 

engagements have concluded except for 

Brownsville, TX, which will have a federal 

team until March 2017.

(2) SC2 National Resource Network

To scale and develop the SC2 model

further and reach up to 70 additional 

cities, the SC2 Council established the SC2 

National Resource Network (SC2 NRN).

With the oversight of the SC2 Council, and

in coordination with a consortium of 

private sector, non-profit, and academic 

experts, the SC2 NRN provides:

 On-the-ground technical 

assistance accessible through a 

simple, rolling application

 Remote technical assistance 

accessible through a 311 for Cities 

feature

 Peer-to-peer city networking 

opportunities

 A one-stop interagency federal 

technical assistance 

clearinghouse and curated 

resource library

 Policy analysis and development

The consortium launched its one-stop 

resource platform and first-in-the-nation 

311 for Cities service in May 2014, 
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available to more than 500 cities on the 

SC2 NRN’s website. Direct technical 

assistance engagements and the 311 

service will continue through June 2017.

(3) SC2 Fellows and AmeriCorps 

VISTA Members

The 14 pilot cities with SC2 Federal 

Community Solutions teams also received 

additional capacity from philanthropically 

funded fellows and AmeriCorps VISTA 

members. 

Flint, MI was selected to be part of 

CNCS’s Operation AmeriCorps 

program, which will support up to 80 

AmeriCorps members through 2017.

Thanks to generous funding by the 

Rockefeller Foundation, with 

management by the German Marshall 

Fund of the United States, Cleveland State 

University, and the Virginia Tech 

Metropolitan Institute, the first six SC2 

cities with deployed SC2 teams received 

mid-career, non-federal SC2 fellows to 

complement the work of the federal 

teams. More than two-thirds of the

fellows remained in their local positions 

beyond the two-year term of the 

fellowship. The German Marshall Fund 

completed a final report on the fellowship 

program in 2015. AmeriCorps VISTA 

members also provided additional 

capacity in several of the cities with 

deployed SC2 teams, thanks to 

AmeriCorps waiving the matching funds

requirement for two VISTA members in 

each SC2-designated city.

(4) SC2 Economic Visioning 

Challenge

The SC2 Economic Visioning Challenge 

(SC2 EVC) was a prize competition that 

the Department of Commerce’s Economic 

Development Administration (EDA) 

managed. The SC2 EVC produced 

comprehensive economic development 

blueprints in Greensboro, NC; Hartford, 

CT; and Las Vegas, NV. 

“The city is honored to have received 

six economic development strategies 

to accelerate job growth and business 

expansion, and we congratulate the 

winning team for its Global 

Opportunities Center concept. Those 

ideas will pave the way for the 

economic growth of our city.”

-Jim Westmoreland, Greensboro City 

Manager
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THE VALUE ADDED: WHAT SC2 BRINGS TO THE TABLE

The Strong Cities, Strong Communities Initiative (SC2) has substantial evidence from ongoing 

work in more than 70 cities demonstrating the value of the SC2 approach. Mayors, city staff, 

local partners, federal agencies, and many more stakeholders attest to the efficacy of 

complementing a locally driven vision with the support of a coordinated, interagency federal 

team. These anecdotes are supported by quantitative data reported to the Office of 

Management and Budget as part of agency annual performance reporting and an evaluation 

from Abt Associates of the first six SC2 cities. Finally, SC2 has planned a final evaluation

focused on the SC2 National Resource Network, forthcoming from the Urban Institute in late 

2017.

“Fresno has benefited from the Obama Administration’s [multi]-agency Strong 

Cities, Strong Communities initiative, which helped Fresno with downtown 

development, transportation and workforce development...Fresno has substantially 

supported and improved as a result of the work and our partnership with the 

Obama Administration.”

-Ashley Swearengin, Mayor of Fresno, January 21, 2016

In particular, SC2 adds value by providing:

1. A better federal partner that supports local communities through stronger 

coordination, resulting in improved communication, local understanding of federal 

programs, and utilization of federal resources and stewardship of taxpayer dollars.

2. The power of convening and connecting resulting in new opportunities for 

collaboration and lasting partnerships across multiple sectors and all levels of 

government.

3. Enhanced capacity at the local level for constrained local governments.

4. Information, tools, and data that communities can use to make more informed 

decisions.
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1. A BETTER FEDERAL PARTNER

The challenges many cities face are multi-dimensional and do not fall entirely within the 

purview of one agency or one federal program. However, multiple federal agencies have 

traditionally worked with local governments independently from one another, resulting in 

fragmented efforts and a limited scope for problem-solving. Further, the federal 

government has a history of often taking a one size fits all, top-down approach when 

working with local communities. The key innovation of the SC2 model is that it coordinates 

the efforts of 19 agencies to help communities use the resources available to them more 

effectively and find creative ways of meeting their local goals. All the communities with 

which SC2 works, no matter how challenged or capacity-constrained, come to the table with 

a locally developed vision and a request for this type of federal partnership.

The achievements in SC2 cities demonstrate how the federal government can be a better, 

more coordinated, and responsive partner with local communities, supporting their local 

visions for economic prosperity by building capacity, collaborating on strategic visioning, and 

nurturing partnerships to better position cities for future federal grants. Bringing together 

traditionally disconnected federal agencies and efforts in a non-top-down, comprehensive 

manner that responds to a community’s vision is a defining advantage of the SC2 approach. 

Some of the results of these improved federal-local partnerships include tapping into 

underutilized technical assistance and creatively blending funds from different sources in 

order to solve the most intractable problems, as the following examples demonstrate:

With the interagency coordination of SC2,

Gary, Indiana was able to better leverage 

technical assistance and funding from 

EPA’s Great Lakes Shoreline Cities Grant 

and the National Fish and Wildlife 

Foundation’s Chi-Cal Rivers Fund. Using 

this targeted technical assistance and 

over $600,000 in existing funding, the city

developed a citywide green infrastructure 

strategy. This partnership began by 

incorporating green infrastructure on 

every U.S. Treasury Hardest Hit Fund 
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demolition site, and will expand to 

include greening the city’s gateways and 

managing ongoing neighborhood-scale 

stormwater issues.

Similarly, SC2 team members in Rocky 

Mount, North Carolina built a Farm 

School by working across the USDA’s 

Farm Service Agency and Natural 

Resources Conservation Services, the U.S. 

Department of Commerce, the North 

Carolina Department of Agriculture, the 

USDA Extension Service, the Forest 

Service, and the U.S. Small Business 

Administration to unlock almost $100,000 

in Conservation Technical Assistance 

(CTA) funding and a Matching Funds 

Agreement. The vision of the project is to 

provide year-long training in farming 

skills, business and marketing planning, 

partner relationship-building, and land 

and resource management, leaving 

students equipped to start their own 

businesses in the agriculture industry.

By bridging the efforts of different federal 

agencies, SC2 teams helped several cities 

overcome regulatory barriers that kept 

development from moving forward. One 

regulatory success was at the former 

Pruitt-Igoe housing site in St. Louis, 

Missouri. The EPA, the Army Corps of 

Engineers, and the City of St. Louis

worked together to begin remediating the 

long abandoned site. This work led the 

State of Missouri Department of Natural 

Resources to issue a Certificate of 

Completion, clearing the path for future 

commercial redevelopment. The SC2 

team continued work on the site by 

identifying further methods for 

remediation, strategies to address debris 

piles on the site, and resources to make it 

ready for redevelopment. With the 

National Geospatial Intelligence Agency’s 

new western headquarters being built 

directly to the north and a Choice 

Neighborhood Implementation Grant 

recently awarded to the east, major steps 

have been taken to position the site for 

future redevelopment. 

An SC2 team also took an interagency 

approach to help a city move past 

regulatory obstacles in Gary, Indiana. The

long-abandoned Sheraton Hotel had been 

a symbol of blight for over 30 years in the 

city’s downtown. Building on the work of 

the Partnership for Sustainable 

Communities and coordinating the efforts 

of HUD, DOT, and EPA, the SC2 team

helped realize the city’s goal of 

demolishing the building in October 2014.

The demolition served as a catalyst for 

neighborhood-supported revitalization 

and an opportunity to engage the 

community on future use of the site. SC2 

also helped the city lead a community 

charrette to develop a vision for the site’s

reuse. 

SC2 also helped Macon-Bibb County, 

Georgia to leverage funding from EPA to 

jumpstart downtown development. The 

county has several contaminated 

brownfield sites, many clustered in 

downtown Macon. The cost to the city

alone of assessing and cleaning these 

sites is prohibitive. Through the SC2 

engagement, EPA provided technical 

assistance and guidance on the county’s 

past unsuccessful applications, resulting 

in its first successful application for a 

$400,000 EPA brownfields assessment 

grant in May 2015. Using this federal

funding, the county is conducting

assessments in a prime industrial corridor 

adjacent to the burgeoning downtown. 

These brownfields assessments will 

create more certainty for developers 

interested in investing in the area.
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Spotlight on the National Endowment for the Arts as a Better Federal Partner

The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is one of the nineteen federal agencies 

President Obama called on to collaborate in the SC2 Council, yet is one that often does not 

immediately come to mind as an important player in local redevelopment efforts. However, 

the NEA has a tremendous amount to offer. The NEA’s funding, support, and partnerships 

foster arts learning, the celebration of America’s rich and diverse cultural heritage, and also

works to promote equal access to the arts in all communities. As an integral SC2 federal 

partner, the NEA has contributed significantly to the work in Rocky Mount, North Carolina

and Macon-Bibb County, Georgia.

The City of Rocky Mount, North Carolina envisioned a rails-to-trails project originating at 

the redeveloped downtown train station and connecting the city’s extensive parks and 

greenways system. SC2 convened NEA, EPA, USDA Rural Development, and Health and 

Human Services to work with the city on this project. As a result of collaboration with NEA, 

the rails-to-trails project will feature cultural and education sites including a plaza honoring 

Rocky Mount native Thelonious Monk, the Imperial Centre for the Arts and Sciences, the 

local library, and a new Brew Mill complex. EPA funded a feasibility study and convened 

local stakeholders to imagine the project—now named the Monk to Mill trail. 

The NEA also identified the Arts+Agriculture Conference hosted by Art-Force, a national 

nonprofit, as an opportunity for the city’s Imperial Centre for Arts and Sciences. Rocky 

Mount hosted the Arts+Leadership: Powering Rural Economies conference in March 2015.

In Macon-Bibb County, Georgia, a partnership with the NEA strengthened the Macon Arts 

Alliance’s current efforts to develop an arts village as an adaptive reuse strategy for the Fort 

Hawkins neighborhood, known as the “Birthplace of Macon.” By collaborating with SC2, the 

NEA provided capacity-building activities to the Arts Alliance on place-making programs, 

while EPA helped secure $40,000 for the Arts Alliance to host a sustainable design and 

community visioning workshop for this new Mill Hill arts village project.

These efforts resulted in the Art Alliance’s first successful application for an NEA Our Town 

grant totaling $134,000 in July 2015. The grant will be used to develop an artist residency 

program in the neighborhood, prepare a cultural plan for Mill Hill, and implement ideas 

from the EPA-funded workshop.
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2. THE POWER OF CONVENING AND CONNECTING

Many communities face challenges when trying to convene and establish lasting 

relationships with important regional stakeholders from multiple sectors. SC2 harnesses the 

neutral convening power of the federal government to bring diverse stakeholders together. 

Specifically, the SC2 initiative develops and leverages partnerships with non-federal entities 

such as philanthropies, anchor institutions, businesses, and non-profit organizations to help 

cities and regions tackle complex problems with comprehensive, collaborative solutions.

This ability to convene local leaders and organizations ensures the right people are at the 

table sharing relevant information with each other. However, SC2 does not do this 

unilaterally or in isolation. The cities SC2 works with actively want SC2 to play this role and 

commit themselves to ensuring lasting collaboration at the local level beyond the SC2 

engagement. 

“Federal government is a ‘neutral convener’ to bring factions together at the local 

level. This is especially relevant in the Kansas City and St. Louis areas where there 

are state boundaries that create political boundaries in shared markets.”

-Kevin Muesenfechter, St. Louis Federal Team Member

SC2 has helped cities form new partnerships, revive old connections, and instill a culture of 

inclusion. As a convener and collaborator, SC2 opens up possibilities for innovative 

approaches to solving persistent local challenges. 

The following examples illustrate how SC2 has applied its federal convening role to bring 

new players to the table and support local collaboration:
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The SC2 National Resource Network’s 

project in the area of Salinas, California is 

a regional effort to improve workforce 

development outcomes throughout the 

Salinas Valley. The cities of Greenfield, 

Gonzales, King City, and Soledad are 

working in partnership with Salinas, 

convened by the SC2 NRN. The Salinas 

Valley economy is driven by the 

agriculture sector (farming, harvesting, 

produce processing, and shipping), which 

has been implementing increasingly 

innovative forms of agriculture 

technology. However, low education and 

skill level make it difficult for employers 

to find the labor they need. The SC2 NRN

is working with the five cities, workforce 

training providers, schools, and 

employers to launch a long-term, 

coordinated, regional workforce 

development initiative with the goal of 

improving the community’s ability to 

connect residents to higher-skilled, 

higher-paid jobs. As a result of the SC2 

NRN engagement, Salinas and its 

neighboring cities have now partnered to 

fund a local workforce program 

clearinghouse at a local community 

college.

The SC2 initiative spurred vital 

connections with anchor institutions such 

as universities, medical centers, and 

hospitals. Anchor institutions are often 

the largest non-governmental employers 

in their regions, and importantly for 

economically challenged cities, prime real 

estate developers. However, many local 

governments lack relationships and 

regular communication with anchor 

institutions. SC2 has connected many

cities with anchor institutions to establish

meaningful collaboration involving the 

identification of shared interests and 

creation of joint goals. 

The SC2 NRN worked in Meridian, 

Mississippi to help the city initiate and 

solidify strong working relationships with 

two of its largest employers—Rush 

Foundation Hospital and Anderson 

Regional Medical Center—and produce a 

comprehensive framework for the 

development of a Health District that 

would improve connections to 

downtown. The plan helps the city

continue the momentum behind 

revitalizing downtown to the area around 

the hospitals, and it supports future 

growth of one of the city’s most 

important sectors. In addition, the plan 

helps the city facilitate discussions with 

hospitals and other potential investors in 

the area by defining a vision for the 

Health District, ultimately providing a 

roadmap for implementation that will 

help the city apply for city and state 

incentives. Mayor Percy Bland has noted 

that the SC2 NRN’s engagement has been 

a catalyst for large-scale downtown 

economic development in Meridian.

The SC2 NRN is also convening a broad 

array of stakeholders to work on poverty 

reduction in Springfield, Missouri, where 

poverty rates are significant and 

increasing. The city’s higher education 

institutions and medical anchors are 

important economic engines with 

untapped potential to drive growth,

contribute to upward mobility, and 

provide leadership—alongside 

government—in implementing specific 

efforts designed to reduce poverty. The 

SC2 NRN is working with the city

government and its principal universities 

and hospitals to develop shared goals and 

action steps to formalize this partnership 

with a community compact.

Through a Department of Commerce 

Economic Development Administration

technical assistance grant identified by 

SC2, the City of Youngstown, Ohio
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partnered with the Youngstown State 

University (YSU) Center for Urban and 

Regional Studies to create a Citywide 

Economic Development Strategic Plan. 

The Plan identifies a vision and action 

plan, including a branding initiative 

fostered by the YSU Design Works.

Additionally, the city has partnered with 

Kent State University’s School of Design 

to create community charrettes for future 

downtown planning activities, and with 

Mercy Hospital Systems, the Western 

Reserve Transit Authority, and the 

Western Reserve Port Authority to hire a 

consultant to design a master plan for the 

downtown.

The SC2 team in Rocky Mount, North 

Carolina helped the city align educational 

institution resources with local 

government priorities through EPA’s 

College/Underserved Community 

Partnership Program. This initiative 

develops a network of local colleges and 

universities to provide ongoing technical 

assistance to Rocky Mount and other 

rural towns in the region on a range of 

issues from general management to 

specific policy priorities. Participants 

include Nash Community College, 

Edgecombe Community College, North 

Carolina Wesleyan College, Barton 

College, East Carolina University, and 

North Carolina State University.

In Brownsville, Texas, SC2 helped to start 

a conversation with the community 

colleges and school districts about 

curricula that support current and future 

workforce needs. SC2 and the Texas 

Workforce Solutions hosted a local 

convening between advanced 

manufacturers, local economic 

corporations, community colleges, and 

school districts. This was a second 

dialogue that resulted from a previous 

roundtable convening hosted by the U.S. 

Department of Energy, U.S. Department 

of Commerce, and U.S. Small Business 

Administration in hopes of continuing to 

jumpstart community partners to 

understand what federal assessment data 

and tools are available to leverage future 

opportunities. 

In September 2015, the SC2 NRN 

published the report, Striking a (Local) 

Grand Bargain: How Cities and Anchor 

Institutions Can Work Together to Drive 

Growth and Prosperity. The report, which 

draws on successful and unsuccessful 

efforts in cities where SC2 has worked, 

offers strategies on the role of anchor 

institutions and their potential as major 

partners in economic and community 

development. The report concludes that 

negotiation must occur at the local level, 

based on shared goals and a mutually 

determined vision. The report also 

outlines three steps as a blueprint for 

creating mutually beneficial partnerships: 

establishing the bargain, leveraging 

supportive mechanisms, and maintaining 

an ecosystem for collaboration.

Spotlight on Collaboration with the Federal Reserve System

SC2 invited the Federal Reserve to serve as an important partner and co-convener with the 

ability to bring lending and financial institutions to the table. The Federal Reserve’s regional 

banks in St. Louis, Chicago, and Dallas provided tremendous value to the cities of Memphis, 

Gary, Rockford, and Brownsville. The new relationship with the Federal Reserve brought 

new partners to the table in each city, importantly partners with lending ability.

Rockford, Illinois partnered with the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago to host a Lenders’ 

Convening in April 2015 as part of a larger strategy to advance four local priorities: 
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establishing a regional land bank; forming Rockford’s first Treasury-certified Community 

Development Financial Institution (CDFI); developing a workforce training center in a 

distressed neighborhood; and supporting the Rockford Promise, which works to remove 

financial barriers to Rockford Public Schools graduates in attaining post-secondary 

education.

The Lenders’ Convening had more than 100 attendees, including 14 financial institutions; 

federal staff from HUD, Department of Labor, FDIC, Federal Home Loan Bank, Office of the 

Comptroller of Currency, HHS, U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA), the Chicago Federal 

Executive Board, U.S. Department of Veteran’s Affairs, FEMA, and EPA; academic

institutions; Rockford Public Schools; faith-based leaders; non-profit organizations; and 

local, county, and state representatives. This landmark convening has given the city lasting 

relationships it continues to use as it works to address the four priorities. 

In Gary, Indiana, the city, in partnership with the SC2 team, Fifth Third Bank, and the 

Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, convened a Banker’s Roundtable in January 2015.

Community, regional, and national financial institutions with a market footprint in Gary and 

Lake County were invited to attend. City officials and the SC2 team presented shovel-ready 

investment opportunities in Gary that had the potential to qualify for credit under the 

Community Reinvestment Act. 
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3. ENHANCED CAPACITY FOR CONSTRAINED LOCAL 

GOVERNMENTS

With constrained budgets and often stagnant population growth, the local governments SC2 

supports face overwhelming challenges. SC2 helps to bridge the capacity gap in a number of 

ways. Federal SC2 Community Solutions team leads offered an immediate increase in the 

capacity of city hall, while AmeriCorps VISTA members and SC2 Fellows provided additional 

bandwidth. Cities with SC2 NRN engagements benefitted from broad external technical 

expertise. Whatever the form of the support, SC2 teams focused on root problems rather 

than their symptoms, bolstering the capacity of the local government.

The following examples demonstrate how SC2 has increased communities’ ability to address 

local challenges:

In Providence, RI, the SC2 NRN team 

worked with city leadership to develop a 

10-year financial plan to balance budgets 

and provide for key investments, while 

better integrating governmental 

departments. The SC2 NRN also worked 

with the city to bring community

stakeholders into the process, including 

colleges, universities, business 

organizations, nonprofits, and 

foundations. The approach has received 

praise from local leaders, as well as local 

and national media. In November 2016, 

the city’s credit rating was raised by Fitch 

Ratings, due in part to the progress they 

made implementing the SC2 NRN’s 

recommendations in the 10-year plan.

Experts in the SC2 NRN are also 

supporting efforts of city finance staff in 

Richmond, California to balance the 

budget. Richmond is one of the most 

economically challenged cities in 

California. Without a multi-year approach 

to budgeting, Richmond risked continued 

credit downgrades and an inability to 

address other pressing challenges such as 

affordable housing. The SC2 NRN 

engagement helped the city develop a 

five-year financial plan that avoids fiscal 

distress and starts this Bay Area city on 

the road to prosperity. 

“These discussions will move from 

providing information to making 

public policy decisions that will.... get 

us to a balanced budget in June. This 

is not the end, but is the beginning. As 

we move forward, these discussions 

are going to get more detailed and 

more contentious, and hopefully we 

will hold together and do the right 

thing.” 

– Mayor Tom Butt, Richmond

(Source: December 15, 2015 Council presentation of 

Budget Model)

In Brownsville, Texas, SC2 increased

capacity of local leadership by pairing city 

employees with federal counterparts for 

professional development. The city 

recognized that they had limited human 

capital and wanted to strengthen their 

organization and relationship with the 

federal government. As part of the initial 

stages of understanding the SC2 initiative, 

the city manager invited city employees 

to a strategic planning session and asked 

them to partner with the federal SC2 

team. SC2 and the City of Brownsville 

facilitated a series of five internal 
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workshops that culminated in a two-day 

session between the city and the federal 

SC2 team members in November 2015. 

The SC2 team facilitated the work 

sessions and provided technical 

assistance to the selected work areas that 

the city government and community of 

Brownsville outlined in a draft workplan. 

The result was the organization of efforts 

that were focused, holistic, and 

maximized the goals of both local and 

federal organizations.

“I think much of what we do is 

changing the way that localities do 

their regular business. We could give 

cities funding, but if they don’t have 

the capacity to administer and utilize 

the funding, it will be in vain. In this 

way, SC2 is an important first step: 

capacity building needs to be in 

partnership with funding.”

-Laura Gomez, Brownsville, TX SC2 

Team Lead

The SC2 NRN built capacity with the 

Unified Government (UG) in Kansas City,

KS to implement their plan to create a 

downtown health campus. The project is 

simultaneously a community 

revitalization strategy and an effort to

improve the city’s last-place ranking 

statewide in overall health outcomes. The 

SC2 NRN provided expert technical 

support to the UG in its selection of a 

Healthy Campus project manager, 

including drafting the job description, 

creating the applicant review framework, 

helping to evaluate the responses, and

participating in the selection interviews as 

a non-voting member. The SC2 NRN also 

helped the city develop a strategy for 

engaging private developers, and worked 

with staff to develop performance metrics 

and milestones for the Healthy Campus.

“[The Network has been] wonderful 

[and] offered great suggestions and 

sophisticated analysis [in 

development of the Healthy Campus]”

– Kansas City Mayor Mark Holland

(Source: Wilkes Barre Times Leader, June 14, 2015)

In Danville, Virginia, the SC2 NRN

supported revitalization strategies 

through the establishment of a nonprofit 

community development corporation

(CDC) focused on issues such as housing, 

health, and neighborhood economic 

development. In conjunction with civic 

leaders and community stakeholders, the 

SC2 NRN helped identify: initial funding 

for the organization, appropriate 

neighborhoods for targeted investment, 

and an initial direction and strategies for 

the CDC that will be supported by a multiyear commitment from the city and the 

Danville Regional Foundation.

In Waco, Texas, the SC2 NRN helped the 

city implement a collective impact 

framework for fighting poverty. When the 

SC2 NRN landed in Waco, the city and 

civic leadership in Waco had come 

together to focus on a community-wide 

effort to reduce the city’s poverty rate, 

called Prosper Waco, but were not sure 

where to start on their nine goals focused 

on improving education, health, and 

financial security. The SC2 NRN provided

intensive, cross-cutting implementation 

support to the city and Prosper Waco to 

help them prioritize goals, develop 

specific implementation steps, and 

benchmark and track progress. The SC2 

NRN focused on aligning city budget 

resources with their priorities, developing 

a downtown development strategy that 

incorporates surrounding low- and 

moderate-income communities, and 

developing and implementing specific 
15

strategies and pilot programs focused on 

employing hard-to-employ young people.

“There was a tremendous appeal to us 

for the Network because of the 

technical expertise going into an area 

that we had not been. We have done a 

really good job of developing the 

community awareness of our needs 

and our challenges, but because of the 

scope and complexity of it, we really 

didn’t know how to target specific 

strategies. ... We need to now hit the 

ground running with specific 

strategies, and we need somebody 

that’s been there before to guide how 

we develop these. ... We felt like the 

National Resource Network would 

help us.” 

– Mayor Malcolm Duncan, Jr., Waco

(Prosper Waco interview with Mayor Duncan and 

SC2 NRN Executive Director David Eichenthal, 

http://wccc.tv/videos/view/140823907)
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4. EQUIPPING CITIES WITH INFORMATION, TOOLS, AND 

DATA TO INFORM DECISION-MAKING

Beyond lending a hand where it is needed, SC2 also provides cities with valuable 

information, tools, and data that they can use to shape their strategies moving forward. As 

data become more widely available, their use becomes an increasingly important tool for

cities in program planning and implementation. City budgets must continue to do more with 

less in the aftermath of the recent recession. Information technology systems are an 

important tool for lowering costs and increasing efficiency. Further, city leaders need to 

know whether new programs and policies are achieving the intended impact. 

Data collection and analysis can inform and improve governments’ efforts to address their 

most critical challenges. Many cities find the process of identifying, collecting, and 

maximizing these tools and data daunting and expensive. Data-driven decision-making is an 

easier prospect than it may at first seem, and the federal government has the authority to 

collect and analyze large data sets that are not always easily accessible to local 

governments. SC2 teams have helped cities harness this potential through partnerships with 

the Department of Justice Diagnostic Center, the SC2 National Resource Network’s 

Municipal Health Data for American Cities project, and HUD’s Office of Policy Development 

and Research, among others.

Technical Assistance Clearinghouse 

and Resource Library

The SC2 NRN provides the country’s only 

one-stop source for identifying best 

practices and federal technical assistance 

programs offered to local governments 

and communities. Currently, the 

clearinghouse is an exhaustive list of 

federal resources that help local 

economies turn around, with plans of 

growing to include resources from state 

and local agencies and non-governmental 

organizations. Since launching in February 

2014, thousands of visitors have 

conducted searches among hundreds of 

best practices and valuable resources on 

in the library. 

Spotlight on Using Data to Advance Local Priorities 

Often an important step to any successful economic development initiative is to reduce 

crime. Data-based decision-making plays an especially critical role in public safety, as robust

local and federal crime statistics can inform policing strategies. SC2 has connected the 

Department of Justice (DOJ) and its Office of Justice Programs (OJP) with the local police and 

other community partners to build their local capacity to track and reduce crime in a 

focused and effective way.

Police staff in Youngstown worked with OJP’s Diagnostic Center to refine their protocols for 

addressing crime. Rather than only reacting to crime reports, Youngstown Police 

Department staff learned to use crime data to measure and understand community needs

better, recognize trends, establish baselines, and determine data-driven strategies, as well 

as proactively deploy available community resources. The Diagnostic Center is now working 
17

with the Youngstown Police Department to institutionalize best policing practices. The 

Diagnostic Center delivered a train-the-trainer course in Community Policing to more than 

30 participants, including representatives from the Youngstown Police Department, 

community, municipal departments, and the Youngstown University Police Department. 

Analysis of pre- and post-surveys administered to participants indicated an increase in 

knowledge by participants across six assessment areas of the community policing 

curriculum. Youngstown Police Department trained 12 sworn staff to serve as community 

policing trainers. In the fall of 2016, Youngstown Police Department delivered community 

policing training to 126 YPD officers as part of its annual in-service training.

Similarly, Rockford’s partnership with the Diagnostic Center helped local partners to

develop data-driven strategies for reducing violent crime, with a specific focus on decreasing

gun violence and heroin use. The partnership also provided recommendations to the city for 

enhancing police-community relations. DOJ’s Diagnostic Assessment Report included a 

crime data analysis, as well as a set of findings based on stakeholder interviews identifying

the city’s strengths, evidence-based solutions to address some of the gaps, and 

recommended implementation strategies. The U.S. Department of Health and Human 

Services helped DOJ establish public health responses and adopt best practices to address 

the challenges contributing to violent crime and heroin abuse. The report’s findings led the 

city to pull together a steering committee to implement the recommendations. DOJ will 

partner with the steering committee to develop an implementation plan. This work will tie 

in closely with the Tri-County Reentry Coalition’s efforts, which seek to support citizens 

returning to the region after serving prison sentences. 

Municipal Health Data for American 

Cities Pilot

With funding from the Robert Wood 

Johnson Foundation, the SC2 NRN 

equipped four cities—Flint, MI; Kansas 

City, KS; Providence, RI; and Waco, TX—

with the first-ever municipal-level health 

data dashboard to inform local decisions 

and measure the impact and 

effectiveness of local programs and 

priorities. Prior to this intervention, 

health data was often captured at the 

county-level, which made it difficult for 

city leaders to gain a clear picture of the 

state of public health within their 

boundaries. Led by the SC2 NRN, in 

consultation with federal data providers 

and health experts, city leaders selected

which indicators to include in the 

dashboard and track moving forward.

This initiative requires cities to examine 

their chronic health problems, share 

knowledge with peer cities, and develop 

innovative ways of describing and 

interpreting the state of health of in their 

communities. With a clear and 

comprehensive view of their health 

landscapes, the city leaders in this pilot 

are better equipped to take municipallevel action for health.
18

Mapping for Impact

GIS and other mapping technologies 

provide cities with the ability to spatially

track data related to several common 

municipal issues. Many SC2 cities do not 

have a planner on staff, or lack the 

capacity to use GIS in a sophisticated way.

SC2 has helped cities identify 

opportunities to develop or improve 

mapping systems that can bolster their 

data-driven decision making efforts, 

especially with regard to blight, vacancy, 

and development opportunities.

The SC2 team in Flint, Michigan

established a unique partnership between 

the city government and HUD to provide 

powerful new data on vacant housing. In 

2012, the city developed a database of all 

residential parcels in Flint—including 

information about the condition of 

structures—but was faced with the 

constant challenge of identifying the 

occupancy status of any particular 

building. With the help of data from the 

U.S. Postal Service, HUD’s Office of Policy 

Development and Research augmented 

the database, identifying homes likely to 

be vacant. HUD then created an online 

interactive map for Flint’s Police and Fire 

Departments and the Code Enforcement 

Office, and updates it annually. This tool 

provides the city with the information it 

needs to target blight elimination and 

focus police and fire resources.

SC2 involvement has also created a 

mapping initiative in St. Louis, Missouri.

SC2 made the city aware of the 2015 

Community Progress Leadership Institute 

(CPLI) on Vacant Spaces at Harvard 

University. The city applied and won a 

scholarship for their employees to attend 

the training. Since then, the city has 

received ongoing technical assistance 

from CPLI on tax foreclosures and an 

overall strategy on comprehensive 

vacancy reduction, including identifying 

and mapping all vacant land parcels in the 

city. St. Louis deployed two teams of 

VISTA members that surveyed over 

30,000 land parcels during a four-month 

period. The work will be continued by the 

St. Louis Economic Development 

Partnership, the sponsor of the St. Louis 

Promise Zone, and a new team of VISTA 

members will survey additional land 

within the Promise Zone footprint in both 

the city and county portions of North St. 

Louis.

Brownsville, Texas is one of the many 

vulnerable communities along the USMexico border when considering climate 

change and public health. The EPA is 

working to understand the most pressing 

needs of the community through 

programs such as ENVIRO-Atlas and 

Citizen Science. Through the SC2 

designation, the EPA invited Brownsville 

to collaborate with researchers in its 

Office of Research and Development on 

extramural research around engaging 

citizens and community partners on 

temporal-spatial analysis of mosquito 

breeding habitats and mitigating vectorborne diseases. This is a collective 

partnership between federal, local, and 

community organizations to enable the 

community to be educated, engaged, and 

solution-oriented when it comes to 

understanding the environment in which 

they live. Federal and local communities 

will be able to better mitigate and be 

better prepared for emergency threats 

and natural disaster affects. 

311 for Cities

The technical assistance that the SC2 NRN 

provides is unique in its applicability to a 

broad range of issue areas. Typically, a 

single federal agency provides technical 

assistance on a single issue, such as 

homelessness or education. However, 

most cities face multiple, complex, and 
19

inter-related challenges that may 

exacerbate one another. The SC2 NRN

allows cities to present multi-faceted 

problems to experts who work across 

disciplines to find innovative, 

interdisciplinary solutions. The NRN’s 311 

for Cities feature connects cities with its 

consortium of public, private, and nonprofit partners to receive quick answers 

on cross-cutting issues. Cities from 

around the country have used the 311 for 

Cities service to obtain answers and policy 

options for their most pressing needs. The 

NRN has answered questions on such 

wide ranging topic as IRS tax liens on 

abandoned properties, public health 

strategies, and incentives to support main 

street economic development. A 

catalogue of responses can be found in 

the SC2 National Resource Library. 
20

LOOKING AHEAD

As our nation transitions to a new president, SC2 will wrap up its remaining work and our 

staff will be ready to share lessons learned and assist the incoming administration. 

Brownsville, our final active city of the 14 cities with deployed SC2 Federal Community 

Solutions teams, will complete its two-year engagement in March 2017. The SC2 NRN’s 

many ongoing direct technical assistance engagements will continue through June 2017, 

when the current cooperative agreement ends. Although all SC2 direct engagements will 

come to a conclusion by summer 2017, so much of what we have learned in this pilot will 

live on and inform the future work of the federal government as well as the expectations of 

local communities. 

Our team continues to hear from stakeholders in cities where we have worked and federal 

staff who have served on our teams just how much the SC2 experience has changed their 

expectations of federal-local partnerships. The federal government can be a better, more 

responsive partner to communities that want the government involved and come to the 

table with a local vision and the resolve to see it through. The federal government can do a 

better job of collaborating and coordinating across federal agencies to more effectively 

steward taxpayer dollars that help communities achieve real results on the ground. It simply 

makes sense. 

We know that this model works. In addition to the qualitative testimonies and the 2014 

evaluation from Abt Associates, the Urban Institute will complete an evaluation later in 2017 

assessing SC2, with a specific focus on the SC2 National Resource Network technical 

assistance program. Federal agencies have realized the value of this type of coordination 

and delivery of services. SC2 has shaped two recent developments that will have a lasting 

legacy. At HUD, one agency deeply involved in SC2 that has a long history of working with 

communities and a robust field infrastructure in place, staff looked to emulate the SC2 

model so employees can better serve communities. Building from the SC2 model, HUD 

established new performance standards, staffing functions, and training resources to enable 

HUD staff to be active, supportive partners to the communities they serve. In order to 

capture the lessons and best practices of SC2 and related work, the Obama Administration 

has created a Community Solutions Council to streamline and reconfigure the way the 

federal government works with communities to improve outcomes. The Council is just one 

tangible manifestation of leaving the federal government in a better place, and, as the work 

of government continues, the Council will equip leadership with an important tool as the 

federal government inevitably listens more to local communities and undertakes resulting 

new policies and initiatives. 

The success of the SC2 pilot proves that we can strengthen partnerships between federal 

and local governments for the benefit of the American people. This approach is ready for 

further action on a larger scale by new federal and local leaders. In order to leverage these 

lessons at scale, new leadership will need to invest in continuing and expanding these 

strategies. The vast majority of SC2 team members are career federal staff who will remain 

in federal service and stand ready to share what they learned and support this approach.
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Published by:

The White House Council on Strong Cities, Strong Communities

January 2017