Action Guide

Seventeen discrete and practical implementation actions organized into four phases to move community-scale projects from vision to reality.
  • Groundwork

  • Roadmap

  • Governance

  • Implementation

Browse Actions By Phase

The Groundwork phase helps communities gather insights and build a collective understanding of the neighborhood and the people who live in it. Key actions include organizing a Working Group, identifying opportunities and threats, setting a geographic boundary, asset mapping, and documenting land use plans, projects and programs.

The Governance phase focuses on developing a collaboration and decision-making framework and comprehensive community vision to lead and oversee all aspects of Just Communities implementation.

The Roadmap phase focuses on the creation of a comprehensive implementation strategy to successfully shape, guide, and leverage neighborhood-scale community development investments.

The Implementation phase focuses on long term implementation, which includes 1) management of all aspects of program, project, and policy delivery and 2) reporting and communicating on progress, annually, to organizational partners, funders, and the broader community.

Key Priorities

  • Identify interested and willing partners
  • Better understanding of shared problems & opportunities
  • Conduct background assessment and scoping
  • Identify key project opportunities
  • Become familiar with the Just Communities Protocol and certification program

Key Priorities

  • Identify interested and willing partners
  • Leverage skills and resources to foster collaboration
  • Identify and clarify areas of agreement and conflict
  • Design and implement a community engagement strategy
  • Develop governance model
  • Select backbone organization to house the work
  • Develop a clear and compelling vision

Key Priorities

  • Create a robust community baseline
  • Identify and select targets that most effectively address the Commitments
  • Assess strategies to ensure they address racial equity and climate resiliency goals
  • Develop action plan for achieving Commitment targets and Community vision

Key Priorities

  • Effectively implement the Work Plan
  • Measure impact and track progress towards targets
  • Shape effective and transparent governance
  • Strengthen stakeholder trust, engagement, and knowledge sharing

Why Just Communities Actions?

We developed the Just Communities Actions to help organize multi-partner community and urban development projects:

  • Build local capacity and resident leadership
  • Structure collaborative governance models
  • Develop indicators and targets to measure impact over time
  • Embed racial equity and climate resilience in all decision-making
  • Develop a comprehensive roadmap to guide program and project investments
  • Oversee long-term implementation
  • Build trust among stakeholders