Prof. Reckhow Co-Authors Brookings Report on Philanthropy and Suburban Poverty
Monday, 25 July 2011 15:53
As Suburban Poverty Grows, Regional Philanthropies Need to Help Hold the Social Safety Net Together
New Brookings report recommends philanthropies shift focus and expand their regional support
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Rising poverty in America's suburbs is challenging regional philanthropies to re-focus their activities to support growing needs outside cities, according to a new report from the Brookings Institution Metropolitan Policy Program.
The report, Building a Regional Stronger Safety Net: Philanthropy's Role, provides the first indepth analysis of the distribution of philanthropic grants in several metro areas, particularly in their suburbs.
Through case studies in Atlanta, Chicago, Denver, and Detroit, the report evaluates the growth of suburban poverty and the resources available to philanthropies, examines foundation grant distributions, and recommends opportunities for philanthropic investment to expand suburban capacity.
"As the rate of suburban poverty increases, the need to support this population through an adequate nonprofit infrastructure in the suburbs becomes increasingly urgent," said Sarah Reckhow, Assistant Professor at Michigan State University and co-author of the Brookings report.
Among the report's findings:
• Suburban community foundations in the four regions studied are newer and smaller
than those in core cities, despite faster growth of suburban poor populations. In the
regions studied, most suburban community foundations began operating in the 1990s, and
have not accumulated significant asset bases. Some larger city-based foundations have
taken a regional approach, but face restrictions on the extent to which they can address
growing need in poor suburban communities.
• The share of foundation dollars targeted to organizations serving low-income
residents varies widely across regions, but relatively few of those dollars are devoted
to building organizational capacity in the suburbs. Chicago saw the largest share of
foundation grant dollars go to organizations serving low-income people (60 percent),
while Atlanta posted the lowest share (19 percent). Detroit was the only region where total grants to suburban-based human service providers were relatively comparable to
their city-based counterparts.
• Suburbs with high rates of poverty have substantially fewer grantees and grant
dollars per poor person than either central cities or lower-poverty suburbs. Though
metropolitan Atlanta has the highest rate of suburban poverty among the regions studied,
it has the lowest rate of suburban grant-making per poor person. Denver's results are a
mirror image of Atlanta's, with the lowest poverty rate and highest suburban grantmaking per poor person.
• Four types of strategies to build and strengthen the capacity of the suburban safety
net are showing promise in these regions. Each region is engaging in four types of
capacity building strategies: supporting existing regional organizations, creating new
regional organizations, supporting regional networks and establishing new suburban
community foundations.
"Strong public leadership must partner with regional philanthropies to build a robust support
system, especially as demographic changes have shifted geographic needs," said Margaret Weir,
Professor at the University of California, Berkeley and co-author of the Brookings report.
"Innovation alone does not ensure a strong regional safety net."
Foundations that have long focused primarily on urban centers must now work toward
identifying gaps in the regional safety net and promoting new initiatives to close those gaps.
Federal, state, and local policymakers can support these efforts by strengthening the role of
regional intermediaries, including human services as a component of regional planning, and
building permanent regional networks of social service providers connected to state
bureaucracies.
The report is available at:
http://www.brookings.edu/papers/2011/0721_philanthropy_reckhow_weir.aspx.
This report is part of Brookings' Metropolitan Opportunity Series, which documents the
changing geography of poverty and opportunity in metropolitan America, analyzes its drivers
and implications, and offers policy recommendations to enhance the well-being of lower-income
families and communities in both cities and suburbs. For more research in this series, you may
visit: http://www.brookings.edu/metro/Metropolitan-Opportunity.aspx.
The Metropolitan Policy Program at Brookings-Created in 1996, the Metropolitan Policy
Program (MPP) provides decision-makers with cutting-edge research and policy ideas for
improving the health and prosperity of metropolitan areas including their component cities,
suburbs, and rural areas. To learn more visit: www.brookings.edu/metro.
