Community Partners of South Florida Shares
Model for Success with National Affordable Housing Organization
Riviera Beach, FL— Community Partners of South Florida hosted top executives from NeighborWorks America from June 26 to June 28, 2019 to share their work as a “best practices” example of improving the lives of residents through health, housing and community in Palm Beach County. NeighborWorks is a national nonprofit organization that helps individuals, families and communities thrive through comprehensive approaches to affordable housing and community development. Community Partners is NeighborWorks’ only Palm Beach County affiliate.
To provide the fifty NeighborWorks America executives with context for Community Partners’ work, they kicked off the meeting on June 26th by touring the Northend area of West Palm Beach by bus, learning about the history of the community from a race and equity lens and how systems and policy contributed to its current state. A highlight included the Historic Northwest neighborhood that is a part of the City of West Palm Beach’s Mayor’s Village Initiative. Kevin Jones, the City of West Palm Beach’s coordinator of community initiatives, champions the Mayor’s Village Initiative, a collaborative multidisciplinary strategy to prevent and reduce youth violence and improve outcomes for African American boys and young men.
The tour also focused on RISE, a future Purpose Built Community in the Northend Neighborhood of West Palm Beach. RISE is a community-based solution focused on breaking the cycle of poverty through a model that focuses on holistic community revitalization by addressing housing, education, wellness and employment opportunities. Community Partners is providing management services to RISE during its incubation stage through a grant from Quantum Foundation and works closely with RISE executive director Craig Glover and neighborhood residents to engage their expertise and address their needs and concerns.
The tour ended with a reception at Rybovich Marina where local leaders shared how they are collaborating with Community Partners to support families facing social, emotional, and financial adversity. Speakers included Carlos Vidueira, vice president of Rybovich, Dr. Lisa Williams-Taylor, CEO of the Children’s Services Council of Palm Beach County and Abigail Goodwin, vice president of grants and community investments from Palm Health Foundation.
“NeighborWorks has provided our organization with outstanding resources for our affordable housing and community development work in the county,” said Scott Hansel, CEO of Community Partners of South Florida. “We were honored that they chose our organization as a host site for their executives to learn more about our unique model of incorporating behavioral health into our comprehensive system of support to build self-sustaining families and truly change generations by changing the odds.”
Political and community leaders attending the reception included West Palm Beach City Commissioners Christina Lambert and Kelly Shoaf, Annetta Jenkins of the Riviera Beach CRA, Suzanne Cabrera from the Housing Leadership Council of Palm Beach County, Armando Fana from the City of West Palm Beach, and Community Partners board members Allison LaBossiere (chair), Charlotte Pelton, Ricky Petty, Reverend James Cook and Peter Cruise.
About Community Partners of South Florida
Community Partners of South Florida is a $16 million comprehensive community development nonprofit agency headquartered in Riviera Beach that provides services to families facing social, emotional and financial adversity. By using a unique, breakthrough approach integrating housing and financial empowerment, child and family mental health, and community services, Community Partners creates self-sustaining families and communities and serves as a driver for growing its local economy. For more information about Community Partners of South Florida, visit cp-cto.org. Community Partners is a proud chartered affiliate of Neighborworks America, a national, nonpartisan nonprofit striving to make every community a place of opportunity. For more information on Neighborworks America, please contact Hilary Rowe Wiley at hwiley@nw.org.