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by Joy Hoffmann, Community Affairs Officer, Federal Reserve
Bank of San
Francisco
Nine diverse states. Nearly
one and a half million square miles of land mass. More than 55 million
people. The
Federal Reserve's Twelfth District has a dizzying array of community
development issues and an equally-overwhelming number of players
in the industry. How does a community development professional
charged with addressing the needs in even a portion of this territory
set priorities?
This
is the ongoing challenge we at the Federal Reserve Bank of San
Francisco have
faced for many years. Given the vast and ever-changing needs in low-
and moderate-income communities, we decided we needed to be much
more methodical in our approach to understanding the issues and setting
our priorities. This led to the production of individual "environmental
assessments" for each of our nine district states.
For
each state, we have conducted an environmental scan by looking at
the demographic, economic, governmental, and financial context through
the community development lens. In addition, each report provides
detail on the specific needs and resources in each state for four
important community development areas: affordable housing, small
business, poverty and asset accumulation, and issues specifically
affecting native people and immigrants.
We
are pleased to publish all nine environmental assessments in conjunction
with this issue of Community Investments, which itself contains
both an overview article on the information gathered and a separate
pull-out section containing two-page summaries of the major findings
for each state. Please take the time to go to our website and print
out the individual reports for the states youre interested in.
We
hope you find these reports useful, and look forward to working together
to address the many community development needs of our district that
are detailed in these reports.
All
the best to you and your families in this New Year.
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