Update: Healing Hands Ministries

Learn more about bcANALYTICS and check out additional reports in the bcANALYTICS Catalog.

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In 2014, bcANALYTICS worked with Healing Hands Ministries on a report to help advocate for a new DART bus stop at the intersection of Greenville Ave. and Royal Ln. in Lake Highlands. Over the past several years, Janna Gardner, the founder and CEO of Healing Hands, has worked tirelessly to bring that goal to fruition alongside District 10 Council Member Adam McGough, the AllinD10 Collection Impact initiative, DART, and other community groups. 

Thanks to all of that hard work, a new bus stop, which will help Healing Hand’s clients have better access to the clinic by public transportation, has opened on DART’s Route 84.

In our previous work, we found that Healing Hands was located further from public transportation than other low cost or affordable health care options, which proves a challenge for the thousands of low-income families and individuals who receive services from Healing Hands—the nearest stop was roughly ¾-mile away from Healing Hands clinic, while most organizations, as we found, have a stop less than ¼-mile away. 

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The data and information prepared by [bc], with support from Communities Foundation of Texas, was an important tool in Janna’s effort to provide better public transportation to the families who rely on Healing Hands for health care services. 

We celebrate this community victory with Healing Hands Ministries today and will continue to work to equip community leaders with the tools and data analytics services that they need to advocate for positive change. 

Read the full report here!
 

THIS WORK WAS SUPPORTED BY
As the largest community foundation in Texas and one of the largest in the nation, Communities Foundation of Texas (CFT) works with families, companies and nonprofits to strengthen our community through a variety of charitable funds and strategic grantmaking initiatives. The foundation professionally manages more than 900 charitable funds and has awarded more than $1.3 billion in grants since its founding in 1953. Increasing financial stability of working families is one of the two key focus areas of CFT’s community impact funds. To support this area, CFT has launched the Data Driven Decision-Making (D3) Institute. The D3 Institute is designed to provide organizations that offer programs and services for low-income working families the power to accelerate their development of enduring solutions to the social and economic problems facing this population. www.cftexas.org/D3

Healing Hands Ministries

We are publishing a collection of reports and documents prepared by bcANALYTICS to help nonprofit and community-based organizations serve their clients and communities through data-driven research and analysis. Check out more bcANALYTICS reports here.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Four of the primary challenges that negatively impact the health of Americans are:
(1) The high cost of healthcare
(2) The high rate of uninsured
(3) The high rate of poverty
(4) Poor transportation access to care

By providing affordable healthcare to thousands of uninsured patients earning at or below 200% of the poverty level, Healing Hands Ministries effectively and compassionately remediates three of these challenges for people in the Lake Highlands and greater Dallas area.

Currently, however, Healing Hands Ministries is underserved by public transportation, and patients seeking to use their facilities must walk more than one-half mile from the nearest bus stops along inhospitable and fast-moving arterial roads. To more effectively serve a greater population in need, Healing Hands Ministries must be better connected to the Dallas Area Rapid Transit system.

This report will argue for enhanced transportation access for Healing Hands Ministries by drawing attention to the heightened significance of their service provision due to the severe need for quality, affordable healthcare in Dallas; demonstrating the breadth of scope and quality of care Healing Hands provides patients; revealing the inadequacy of transportation connectivity surrounding the intersection of Greenville Avenue and Royal Lane; and recommending several paths forward for pursuing improved integration into the Dallas Area Rapid Transit transportation system.

Below is an excerpt from the Healing Hands report. Read the full report here!

THIS WORK IS SUPPORTED BY
As the largest community foundation in Texas and one of the largest in the nation, Communities Foundation of Texas (CFT) works with families, companies and nonprofits to strengthen our community through a variety of charitable funds and strategic grantmaking initiatives. The foundation professionally manages more than 900 charitable funds and has awarded more than $1.3 billion in grants since its founding in 1953. Increasing financial stability of working families is one of the two key focus areas of CFT’s community impact funds. To support this area, CFT has launched the Data Driven Decision-Making (D3) Institute. The D3 Institute is designed to provide organizations that offer programs and services for low-income working families the power to accelerate their development of enduring solutions to the social and economic problems facing this population. www.cftexas.org/D3

POP Neighborhood Map Update - Modifications to Existing Boundaries!

Based on input we received via the interactive neighborhood boundary drawing tool Draw Your Neighborhood, [bc] has been considering making some changes to the boundaries of a few neighborhoods - Parkdale, Lake Park Estates, L Streets, Merriman Park/University Manor, and Lake Cliff - already on the POP Neighborhood Map. 

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Settlements to Districts - Tracing the Identities of Downtown Dallas Neighborhoods

By Amruta Sakalker

Over the last decade Downtown Dallas has diversified its offerings from a single use office district to include cultural, residential, and entertainment opportunities 24/7. Today’s Downtown Dallas has a rich history of neighborhoods with unique identities and wide range of uses. As Downtown continues to evolve and strengthen its neighborhoods, it is critical to understand the lineage of socio-cultural character, design, and urban fabric that has given the neighborhoods their unique identity. While these identities are malleable, they can impact the direction of development in neighborhoods. Knowing the narratives of identities empowers neighborhoods to evolve stronger representational identities that emerge through their own stories and adds value to them. To illustrate the variety of these evolutions, we trace back Downtown Dallas Districts through this blog post.

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Deepwood & Earth Day

Last night we were honored to screen Out of Deepwood in the Angelika Film Center as part of a partnership with Earth Day TX and TEDxSMU. We had great discussions with folks during a reception preceding the film, talking about our Know Your Neighborhood & Draw Your Neighborhood tools and collecting Neighborhood Stories interviews - keep your eyes out for those in the coming weeks!

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POPonymy - An Interpretive Typology of Dallas Neighborhood Names

By Thomas Simpson

Dallas neighborhood names speak volumes about the city’s complexion. Just as our words offer insight into our character, the way the city describes itself and names its parts- its toponymy- offer insight into its anatomy, its aspirations, its values, and its history. Rather than a study of the origin of individual place names, this is a typology of toponymy, revealing the city’s values through categories of place names. Neighborhoods are the building blocks of cities; what information can we elicit about the city collectively from the kind of names it gives it components?

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[bc] and Downtown Dallas 360

Over the past two months, [bc] has participated in six public events for Downtown Dallas 360, the recently revisited master planning process undertaken by the member-based Downtown advocacy organization Downtown Dallas, Inc (DDI) and its project partners. [bc] is among those partners, teaming up with DDI to incorporate Draw Your Neighborhood into the 360 engagement process. 

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POP at the DHL Boot Camp!

Two weeks ago, as part of our year long POP Neighborhood Map engagement process, [bc] participated in the annual Dallas Homeowners League (DHL) Boot Camp. This years DHL gathering, titled "Return of the City", brought together neighborhood leaders from across Dallas for a day of discussions and best practice-sharing.

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The History of the POP Neighborhood Map

[bc] has always aspired to impact neighborhoods across the state by using design to build capacity and empower communities. In Dallas, [bc] reasoned that in order to support neighborhoods through our work, we first needed to know what and where the neighborhoods of Dallas were, launching what was then known as the Dallas Neighborhoods Project.

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Introducing the POP Neighborhood Map blog!

The POP Neighborhood Map Blog is a new digital platform that will chronicle the evolution of the POP Neighborhood Map and expounds why neighborhoods matter.  The launch of this blog coincides with the  launch of two new interactive digital tools - Know Your Neighborhood and Draw Your Neighborhood - the most recent effort of our ongoing POP Neighborhood Map project. 

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The Second Annual Ark Festival: The History, Present & Future of Tenth Street

Learn more about Activating Vacancy.

Last year, as part of our Activating Vacancy initiative, artist Christopher Blay and [bc] collaborated with the Tenth Street Historic District community to produce the Ark on Noah Street. The Ark is a sculpture, a gallery, a museum and a symbol. When Christopher Blay created the concept of the Ark, a fundamental facet of the project was that it be reproduced yearly to keep art and culture active in the Tenth Street Historic District and to create an opportunity to celebrate, share and reflect on the neighborhood's history and the changes of the year.  

On May 2, 2015, the Ark was again commemorated during the Second Annual Ark Festival, a gathering of the Dallas arts community and the Tenth Street Historic District that was even bigger and better than before! The festival featured a processional of residents with original artwork depicting the neighborhood's history and its growth since the Ark was last seen, a performance of the original Story Corners play "A Freeman Cries for the Future," a visit from the Dallas Zoo, and the return of the Neighborhood Stories: Tenth Street exhibit. There was also a small marketplace for neighbors and arts activities led by Oil and Cotton. 

The Tenth Street Historic District is one of Dallas’ oldest neighborhoods and one of its few remaining freedmen’s towns, communities built by freed slaves following the Civil War. Despite being designated a landmark district by the City of Dallas in 1993 and being listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1994, the neighborhood has lost population and housing stock at a rapid pace. It has also experienced a growth in crime and a deteriorating public image. In response to these challenges, [bc] initiated Activating Vacancy to encourage residents to reshape the vacancy in their neighborhood from blight to opportunity through a series of public art activities, beginning with the Ark on Noah Street.

Activating Vacancy existed at a nexus of creative placemaking, public art and community organizing. Inspired by similar initiatives such as the Heidelberg Project in Detroit and Project Row Houses in Houston, Activating Vacancy sought to set in motion the revitalization of an important historic community, provide commentary regarding an array of urban issues such as vacancy and historic preservation and encourage a democratization of exceptional art in Dallas in terms of audiences, geographies and producers. The Ark on Noah Street was an excellent first step towards achieving these goals. The Ark as a gallery featured artwork produced by neighborhood residents. The Ark as a sculpture artfully repurposed discarded materials from Tenth Street's historic homes into a monument and testament to its history. The Ark as a festival brought neighbors, artists, critics and art consumers together to meet each other, rediscover an often forgotten part of Dallas and imagine a city where any neighborhood can be recognized as a source of valuable cultural producers.

At the Second Annual Ark Festival, it was made clear that the Tenth Street Historic District still faces tremendous challenges. Homes have been repaired, while others have been demolished. Crime is tempered, but it persists. There is also evidence of renewed action in the neighborhood: dozens of attendees wore Operation Tenth Street t-shirts, representing a new, forward-thinking neighborhood organization that has secured grant funding for neighborhood improvement projects. The Greater El Bethel Missionary Baptist Church has been repaired and again opens its doors to song and prayer on Sunday morning. And, the Ark has been rebuilt, fuller and more refined than its previous iteration. 

In addition to the above challenges, there are a bevy of questions that have yet to be answered about the neighborhood that will help illuminate how sustainable its recent burst of energy is. Will Tenth Street be able to continue its revitalization with reduced non-profit activity? What will it take for Tenth Street to develop market interest in rebuilding its historic ground? Have recent efforts sufficiently demonstrated the neighborhood's value to the city at large to insist on its survival, whether through ongoing preservation efforts or through continued nurturing of its unique identity and role as cultural producer? Perhaps some of these questions will be answered and shared at the Third Ark Festival.

Texas ASLA Honor Award 2015: Race and the Control of Public Parks

We're excited to announce our project on Race and the Control of Public Parks has received an Honor Award from the Texas chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects!

According to the Texas ASLA, Professional Honor Awards are given to projects that highlight the diversity, distinction and ingenuity of landscape architecture. Race and the Control of Public Parks won in the research category, and the exhibit recognizes the ways in which the design, construction, programming, use, and alteration/renovation of public parks can reinforce divisions, both physical and perceived, between populations.  

Celebrating Local Heroes

Learn more about our MLK Day of Service projects here.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. challenged us to build a more perfect union and taught us that everyone has a role to play in that effort. For our 2015 service project in his honor, [bc] set out to recognize some of those who serve their communities by releasing the Second Edition of buildingcommunityHEROES trading cards.  By creating a fun, tactile, and pocketable way to learn about those working to improve our communities, we hope to encourage those of all ages to honor their heroes and engage in the causes that speak to them.

We put out the call for local hero nominations at the beginning of January and received just over 100 nominations for those working tirelessly in Dallas, Houston and the Rio Grande Valley.  Nominations included selfless family members, state senators, founders of schools, advocacy group members and fearless neighborhood leaders.  It was not easy, but from here we researched and curated the nominations to get a final group of heroes with a diverse range of causes, ages, backgrounds and levels of impact.  After the final selections were made, the cards were printed, sorted, packaged and ready for a January 19 distribution.

We distributed the cards on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and throughout the week in Dallas, Houston and the Rio Grande Valley.  We hope that the stories of these 24 heroes will inspire people to be more active in their communities.  We also hope that the cards will encourage people to think about and honor their local heroes.  If you were not able to pick up a pack, check out all 24 heroes plus 2014's at www.buildingcommunityheroes.org.

 

Who is your hero?  Share them on social media at #bcHEROES2015 and nominate them for the third edition of trading cards!

Production & Choice for Infill Housing

See more posts about AIM for Dallas and our work in Dallas

As Dallas continues to see new investment and new housing opportunities, it is critical that affordable options remain available or are created throughout the city, and that the local development community have the capacity to deliver those options.

In September, 2014, [bc] hosted Lab #1 of AIM for Dallas. The lab brought a  group of local, regional and national practitioners and experts together to discuss and prioritize the challenges currently inhibiting affordable infill housing production. The group reconvened a second time to determine deliverable solutions for AIM for Dallas goals, discuss housing markets and development cycles as they relate to affordable infill, and apply these goals and market-thinking to realistic development scenarios in Dallas.

Over the course of the fall, [bc] researched the challenges to affordable infill housing that were listed and prioritized at September, 2014’s Lab #1. From this research, [bc] developed case studies exploring solutions to similar challenges from cities around the country. These case studies evolved into a set of goals for AIM for Dallas that would result in deliverable products.

In December, [bc] hosted a webinar where AIM for Dallas’s advisors gave feedback on, modified and confirmed the initiative’s goals.

At Lab #2, advisors suggested deliverables and frameworks for pursuing these goals. Collaboration and information sharing was a common theme across the goals listed. Another theme that emerged was the need for targeted, coordinated neighborhood investments to ensure the most efficient impact. This idea led into a dialogue about the value of market-based awareness in affordable infill delivery. In the final exercise, advisors were divided into four groups with each group piecing together a development plan for a real vacant site within the city, including consideration of market trends in each site’s neighborhood, site configuration and location, and community engagement.

Moving forward, AIM for Dallas will focus on distilling the large set of goals and solutions into five action items, as part of a proposed collaborative. Lab #3 will be held in the Spring with a focus on confirming these action items, establishing a collaborative, and continuing to examine development opportunities as a group.

 

 

Affordable Infill Model (AIM) for Dallas is a multi-year project, generously supported by the Citi Foundation, designed to address gaps in the supply and demand for affordable housing in Dallas. The outcome of this process will be a set of solutions intended to guide the city toward a new market-based model for the creation of affordable infill housing through the use of currently vacant land.

Race and the Control of Public Parks

Learn more about POP Dallas.

Race and the Control of Public Parks is  a 100 year history of the relationship between racial migrations in Dallas and  the development of the city’s park system. An exhibit of graphical and historical research, Race and the Control of Public Parks makes evident that while parks are technically public and that all citizens are, in theory, automatically welcome, we must recognize the ways in which the design, construction, programming, use, and alteration/renovation of public parks can reinforce divisions, both physical and perceived, between populations. Launched on November 14  to coincide with the Facing Race Conference, a national assembly tackling racial justice, this project is just one component of an important critical conversation about racial inequity in cities.

To provide a comprehensive understanding of how the racial makeup of the city has shaped the design and use of public space, the exhibition was composed of four parts: a series of ten historic maps and one contemporary map that trace residential patterns by race and the parks system; an annotated timeline of the evolution of Dallas parks and park typologies over the last 100 years; a series of diagrams that illustrate parks as tools for or sites of nine types of social, economic, infrastructural, and civic controls; and a series of snapshots that illustrate the impact of these controls as they relate specifically to parks and race in the city of Dallas.

This exhibit provides the tools to interrogate the physical city and reveal the multiple ways in which we plan, build, and interact with it, exercising these tools through the lens of public parks and race. As a result of this work, parks will no longer be viewed simply as the green spaces on the map but will be recognized as places of recreation, conflict, celebration, engagement, protest, and daily life. Public parks will be seen as tools used to control social, cultural, economic, infrastructural, and civic activities.  

Research and work produced for this exhibit lay the groundwork for extended work around the Control of Public Space, which will move beyond parks and look at sidewalks, streets, easements, and other forms of public space in the city. This work, like many People Organizing Place projects, gives citizens the ability to experience the city around them with new awareness, revealing hidden voices, histories, and controls that impact their lives on a daily basis. As citizens, we must work to understand our cities and to make them more livable and just for all, especially in our most public places, parks.

What others are saying:

Dallas Affordable Housing

Learn more about AIM for Dallas and our other sustainABLEhouse projects.

Affordable Infill Model (AIM) for Dallas is a multi-year project, generously supported by the Citi Foundation, designed to address gaps in the supply and demand for affordable housing in Dallas. The outcome of this process will be a set of solutions intended to guide the city toward a new market-based model for the creation of affordable infill housing through the use of currently vacant land.

To achieve this goal, AIM for Dallas is bringing together experts on the four main components of providing affordable housing: homebuyer preparedness (pipeline), development, policy, and finance. With administrative support from [bc], these experts - who believe that quality housing is a building block in people’s lives by providing stability, building resources and contributing to strong neighborhoods - will convene and set directions for research and solutions. With continual guidance from this assembled team of expert advisors, [bc] will conduct the necessary research to achieve the project goals.

Lab #1, held on Monday, September 29th, 2014, brought together over 30 practitioners working on affordable housing. These experts participated in a day-long session that established the challenges that AIM for Dallas will address. The day started with an exercise in which the practitioners broke out into interdisciplinary groups where they outlined the challenges for each area of project focus: pipeline, development, policy, and finance. In the second exercise, participants were separated by their area of expertise and, through a facilitated discussion, asked to prioritize the challenges outlined in the first session. At the end of the day, the prioritized lists of issues were brought back to the interdisciplinary groups who then identified the relationships between challenges, across the four workstreams. The output of Lab #1 will inform the next stages of the AIM for Dallas process by focusing the research resources on identifying best practices and solutions advanced in other communities.

Tenth Street Sweep

Read all the Activating Vacancy posts, and learn more about POP Dallas.

The final event of the Activating Vacancy initiative was the Tenth Street Sweep, a physical audit of the neighborhood. Community members, volunteers, and artists collected data to establish a baseline for neighborhood health. They also recorded the conditions of streets, sidewalks, vacant lots, historic structures, street lighting, and several other aspects of the neighborhood identified by community members as potential sites for the audit.  Information gathered will be used to propose, pursue and gauge positive growth and change in the Tenth Street Historic District.  Participants used a smartphone app called rePhoto to take pictures and complete survey questions during the audit

Check out the images from the audit.

After a morning of hard work, we all gathered for a barbecue  lunch at the American Care Academy. Thanks to Preservation Dallas, the The Life of Cities class at the UT Arlington School of Architecture, the 2000 Roses Foundation, Ruth West, the rePhoto team, and all the community members and volunteers who helped with the event!