By Sym Posey | The Birmingham Times
The City of Birmingham has been awarded a $20 million federal grant for workforce investment in the North Birmingham, Northside, Smithfield, and Pratt City communities.
More than a dozen city officials attended the Monday announcement on the second floor of City Hall. Birmingham is one of six recipients from a field of 22 finalists who applied to the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Economic Development Administration (EDA).
The funding will provide in-demand workforce training to residents in the four “distressed communities” through a partnership with Lawson State Community College, a Historically Black College and University (HCBU).
The funding also includes support for entrepreneurs facing disparities in training and capital access and expanding and improving transportation and accessible childcare in the target neighborhoods.
“Reinvest Birmingham is an intentional intersection of people and economic mobility,” said Coreata’ R. Houser, the Interim Recompete Plan Coordinator and Deputy Director for the City’s Department of Innovation and Economic Opportunity. “North Birmingham has faced economic injustice for years and this investment will chart generational change. Our plan centers residents and will have responsive solutions that give them an opportunity to not only survive, but thrive in Birmingham.”
The EDA measures distressed communities by the number of residents ages 25 to 54 who are not participating in the labor force. While a large portion of Birmingham qualifies as distressed, the city has employed an intentional place-based strategy that will focus on increasing labor force participation and access to necessary social support systems.
“I was born in the Northside community, at the once thriving Carraway Hospital,” said Mayor Randall L Woodfin in a statement. “It has long since been a dream to see intentional reinvestment into this community that is home to men, women, and children who deserve an opportunity to fully participate in Birmingham’s prosperous and promising economy.”
Reinvest Birmingham will create and connect people to jobs through five strategic component projects.
- Development of a workforce training center that is centrally located within the community
- Expansion of micro-transit options that ensure residents have affordable means of transportation to access training, employment, and essential services
- Establishment of a Child Care Center of Excellence that not only provides full-day, early learning programming for children and families but increases support for childcare workers and providers
- Creation of a Birmingham Black Business Entrepreneurship Center that serves as a physical front door for Black businesses to launch and scale operations
- Development of a governance model that ensures long-term sustainability for Reinvest Birmingham programming.
The City led the application through a coalition of partners including Lawson State Community College, AIDT, Central Six AlabamaWorks!, the Birmingham Jefferson County Transit Authority, the YMCA of Greater Birmingham, Childcare Resources, Prosper, and Regions Bank, and the Black Business Initiative.
Other cities and projects awarded EDA grants were Allentown, Pennsylvania, $20 million; North Olympic Peninsula, Washington, $35 million; Oasis Expansion, Puerto Rico, $30 million; The Eastern Kentucky Runway, Kentucky, $40 million; Wind River Indigenous-based Economic Plan, Wyoming; $36 million.
