- Loans, training, and technical assistance to small and microenterprise
businesses, including business incubators.
- Workforce development so residents can increase their employment
skills and find livable-wage jobs.
- The development of services designed to reduce the cost of
goods and services, such as food cooperatives, healthcare and
childcare centers.
- Commercial development, such as business districts or neighborhood
grocery stores where residents can purchase more goods and services
within their communities.
CED activities are
supported by an assortment of federal programs: Community Development
Block Grants, Rural Business Enterprise Grants, and the Community
Development Financial Institution Fund, to name a few. The CDFI
Fund administers the New Markets Tax Credit which encourages private
sector investments in communities with persistent poverty. Some
private foundations also offer CED grants for nonprofit organizations.
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Twenty
NeighborWorks network
organizations are actively involved in non-housing community
economic development, and the subject is taught at the NeighborWorks
Training Institute. For community development practitioners,
community economic development (CED) represents a set of diverse
strategies used to improve the economic well-being of residents
of low- and moderate-income communities. These strategies
include: