The concept of shared prosperity will drive Gateway towards a new future. It has never been more important, as Gateway and many other cities across the globe continue to see a growing disparity between the rich and the poor. But these challenges are not unsolvable. Through community engagement, the government can implement programs like sustained public transportation, which aim to improve the lives of many and not just the lives of a few. Community development can also occur outside of the typical government programs and policies. Communities can utilize work cooperatives, community development financial institutions (CDFIs), social enterprises, municipal ownership, emerging hybrid companies, and employee stock ownership plan companies (ESOPs) to improve local neighborhoods. These new models for development can help to create jobs, fuel small businesses, assist residents in accessing financing, bring in new and diverse resources to the community, encourage growth of new, healthy habitats, and, most importantly, move Gateway's citizens towards healthy futures.
Below, Mark discusses Gateway's unique position within Washington DC and talks about how shared prosperity within Gateway could be achieved.
Below, Mark discusses Gateway's unique position within Washington DC and talks about how shared prosperity within Gateway could be achieved.
Transcript - For the last 8 weeks, I’ve been engaged in CityLab, an active learning experience at John's Hopkins’ Carey Business School. I’ve spent my time discovering the Gateway Neighborhood in Washington DC’s Ward 5, inquiring and interacting with its residents, and analyzing data about the community. Throughout the process, I developed a deep understanding of livability challenges in my urban neighborhood and hope that, through targeted solutions, together we can transform urban livability challenges into opportunities for shared value creation within Gateway and beyond.
Gateway’s location within the greater DC area is shown here. What started in the 1500s as a collection of campsites and fishing villages along the fertile banks of the now Anacostia River, shifted to tobacco farms to fruit, vegetable, and grain farms. With roads and railroads came large warehouses that began to shape present day Gateway. Major manufacturing centers took over residential districts. However, these manufacturing centers began a sharp decline in the 1950’s as other easier accessible and more willing suburbs outpaced Gateway’s growth. Accompanying this decline came a shift from white to predominately black residents as white families moved into Virginia and Maryland suburbs with jobs and better land.
Every community around Gateway – Ivy City, Langdon, Fort Lincoln, etc. are all expanding rapidly. Gateway though stands still. After all, nearby communities that are expanding, have pushed original citizens out of the community. However, Gateway does needs resources, food access, healthcare access, and more to fully achieve human flourishing. History shows us that as communities expand, property becomes more valuable and those who cannot afford Gateway anymore have a choice to make – either deal with the increased cost or move out. Sure, the community that emerges is a great new community but at what cost?
With that, I want to shift the focus towards Gateway’s future and provide some discussion on how a community like Gateway can move towards a brighter future.
To move forwards, Gateway needs to create shared prosperity that provides benefits for both residents and investors. Broad based ownership in the community, both in an actual business sense but also in a community sense in creating an overarching vision of the community will be key. Given the complex interaction of resources needed, I propose the addition of a centrally located food co-op for several reasons.
No ESOPs, credit unions, Co-Ops, socially facing companies, nonprofits, and muni or state-owned companies exist in Gateway but they could provide huge benefits. These business models serve to benefit the community and the corporation. To the community, the co-op provides economic stability, career education, access to healthy food, community and social interactions, better health outcomes, and more. To the business, the Co-Op will attract and generate business from an underserved population and would almost become a monopoly within the greater Gateway food desert.
The ultimate goal of the food co-op is to shift the mindset of other businesses within Gateway from outward focused profit generators that only externalize costs onto Gateway and instead, create wealth for both the community and the corporation. The only sustainable way to convince other businesses to care about Gateway is to prove that their is value in doing so – after all, no one said that caring and supporting the community and being profitable must be mutually exclusive. The Food Co-op will be that link.
To protect the community from self-destruction, appropriate rent controls and other mechanisms must be implemented to allow current residents to continue to reside in Gateway.
Currently, what I see in Gateway is a “stressed” population trapped within a negative loop. The lack of financial resources causes a lack of food affordability, further challenged by the fact that there are limited grocery store options and limited transportation options within Gateway. This then causes disease which causes disabilities which causes a further lack of resources. This feedback loop is destructive and takes outside resources and outside help to allow Gateway residents to escape from the loop.
And true, it is not as simple as adding a grocery store or sprucing up greenspace, it provides a start to the multi-faceted, multi-pronged approach needed to address as many of the urban livability challenges as possible. Through investors like yourself and others, we can take the first step in the long process of shifting challenges into opportunities to swing the balance towards shared prosperity within Gateway.
Gateway’s location within the greater DC area is shown here. What started in the 1500s as a collection of campsites and fishing villages along the fertile banks of the now Anacostia River, shifted to tobacco farms to fruit, vegetable, and grain farms. With roads and railroads came large warehouses that began to shape present day Gateway. Major manufacturing centers took over residential districts. However, these manufacturing centers began a sharp decline in the 1950’s as other easier accessible and more willing suburbs outpaced Gateway’s growth. Accompanying this decline came a shift from white to predominately black residents as white families moved into Virginia and Maryland suburbs with jobs and better land.
Every community around Gateway – Ivy City, Langdon, Fort Lincoln, etc. are all expanding rapidly. Gateway though stands still. After all, nearby communities that are expanding, have pushed original citizens out of the community. However, Gateway does needs resources, food access, healthcare access, and more to fully achieve human flourishing. History shows us that as communities expand, property becomes more valuable and those who cannot afford Gateway anymore have a choice to make – either deal with the increased cost or move out. Sure, the community that emerges is a great new community but at what cost?
With that, I want to shift the focus towards Gateway’s future and provide some discussion on how a community like Gateway can move towards a brighter future.
To move forwards, Gateway needs to create shared prosperity that provides benefits for both residents and investors. Broad based ownership in the community, both in an actual business sense but also in a community sense in creating an overarching vision of the community will be key. Given the complex interaction of resources needed, I propose the addition of a centrally located food co-op for several reasons.
No ESOPs, credit unions, Co-Ops, socially facing companies, nonprofits, and muni or state-owned companies exist in Gateway but they could provide huge benefits. These business models serve to benefit the community and the corporation. To the community, the co-op provides economic stability, career education, access to healthy food, community and social interactions, better health outcomes, and more. To the business, the Co-Op will attract and generate business from an underserved population and would almost become a monopoly within the greater Gateway food desert.
The ultimate goal of the food co-op is to shift the mindset of other businesses within Gateway from outward focused profit generators that only externalize costs onto Gateway and instead, create wealth for both the community and the corporation. The only sustainable way to convince other businesses to care about Gateway is to prove that their is value in doing so – after all, no one said that caring and supporting the community and being profitable must be mutually exclusive. The Food Co-op will be that link.
To protect the community from self-destruction, appropriate rent controls and other mechanisms must be implemented to allow current residents to continue to reside in Gateway.
Currently, what I see in Gateway is a “stressed” population trapped within a negative loop. The lack of financial resources causes a lack of food affordability, further challenged by the fact that there are limited grocery store options and limited transportation options within Gateway. This then causes disease which causes disabilities which causes a further lack of resources. This feedback loop is destructive and takes outside resources and outside help to allow Gateway residents to escape from the loop.
And true, it is not as simple as adding a grocery store or sprucing up greenspace, it provides a start to the multi-faceted, multi-pronged approach needed to address as many of the urban livability challenges as possible. Through investors like yourself and others, we can take the first step in the long process of shifting challenges into opportunities to swing the balance towards shared prosperity within Gateway.