STRATEGIC PLAN HIGHLIGHTS
The Los Angeles Urban League (LAUL) has adopted a long term strategic plan focusing on advocacy, leadership and neighborhood change. African Americans, in virtually every facet of their lives, have fewer opportunities than Los Angelinos of other ethnicities. In the “State of Black Los Angeles” (SBLA) report , African Americans scored the lowest “equity index” of any minority population. LAUL seeks to achieve equality for African Americans and other minorities by enabling them to secure economic self reliance, parity, power and civil rights. Achieving equality for the community requires LAUL to play three important roles.

ADVOCACY
Advocacy is central to achieving LAUL’s broader objectives and LAUL will continue to serve as the voice of African Americans and other minority Los Angelinos by advocating on the issues leading to inequity. Over the initial six months, LAUL will develop a set of advocacy priorities to support both its overall equity objectives and its work in the neighborhood. LAUL will engage the community to develop and advance collective priorities. By holding regular town hall meetings, building a strong membership base, and communicating actively to its broader constituency, LAUL will work to build a sustainable force for change.

LEADERSHIP
Developing a strong group of connected African American leaders is central to driving equality for the community. LAUL will foster this key element of its strategy by supporting and developing leadership groups targeted at community members of different age and experience levels. Individual leaders may progress from one group to another, and LAUL hopes to maintain their connection with LAUL over time. Each group will serve multiple functions, including developing the skills of its membership through training and seminars, promoting networking through social and professional events and providing opportunities to mentor others. These mentor relationships will be vital to developing the next group of leaders at each level.

NEIGHBORHOOD CHANGE
LAUL will work with partners to provide services in each of the five major areas identified in the SBLA report: education, employment, safety, health, and housing. LAUL will take on different roles in each area depending on its own expertise, the availability of partners, and the needs of the community.

In education, LAUL will work throughout the life of a student, from pre-K through high school, to foster a rigorous experience in the schools, a relationship with a caring adult, a connection with relevant career options, and a positive peer culture. LAUL’s employment strategy leverages and builds on its current employment programs at its WorkSource Centers, the Milken Family Literacy and Youth Training Center, and Youth Opportunity program in an effort to reduce unemployment and poverty rates in the neighborhood by 50%. The safety strategy will be executed in partnership with the Los Angeles Police Department and will focus on three levels: engaging the community in the safety solution, addressing gangs, and re-integrating ex-offenders. In health, LAUL will work with partners to reduce the number of families in crisis and to support long-term healthy outcomes for residents. This includes programs for those families most in jeopardy (indicated by domestic violence, drug use, chronic unemployment, etc.) and an emphasis on better lifestyle choices, such as healthy eating habits and exercise. Finally, for housing, LAUL will work with a partner such as Operation Hope to ensure that current homeowners are able to stay in their homes and that more residents will be able to afford both homeownership and rental costs.

LAUL believes that to have the transformative impact it seeks will require working on four different levels: a foundation, opportunities, social systems, and high expectations:

LAUL selected a neighborhood that both maximizes its chance for success and makes a compelling case to others that this approach can work even in difficult situations. “The State of Black Los Angeles” report identified two neighborhoods – Crenshaw and Hyde Park – as areas with both a large African American presence and significant needs. LAUL selected a 70 square block area in Park Mesa Heights which surrounds Crenshaw Senior High School. As the map below indicates, Park Mesa Heights is the best fit for LAUL given its proximity to LAUL headquarters and faciities.

Monitoring outputs in the form of programmatic success will serve as an important internal indicator in ensuring that LAUL’s programs, and those of its partners, are achieving the desired impact within the community. Over time, these activities will lead to measurable outcomes in the community in the form of real changes in the lives of those involved in the neighborhood pilot. Finally, LAUL will track impact metrics which represent the “bottom line” for its programs. Impact metrics are the ultimate set of measures for which LAUL will hold itself accountable.

While most of this plan is focused on the pilot surrounding Crenshaw Senior High in Park Mesa Heights, it is important to note that the ultimate goal of this work is to build a sustainable model for change that can be replicated in underserved neighborhoods across Los Angeles. The scale of the problems in L.A. is tremendous, and the size of investment required to launch this pilot is substantial.

With a well tested model and metrics to show how a community can transform, LAUL hopes to demonstrate that this kind of investment in a neighborhood can be leveraged to change the way government, nonprofits, individuals and the community can work together to create meaningful and lasting change.