Alliance for Metropolitan Stability

“The board's executive committee reviews the form 990 for approval. Once approved, the 990 is signed and submitted.”

“Each year, board members are required to fill out the conflict of interest forms. Key staff members in positions of making spending or contracting decisions also fill them out. The staff collects the forms and keeps them on file at the direction of the executive committee of the board.”

“The executive committee of the board oversees the annual review of the executive director and asks all staff, board members and key coalition member representatives and allied organization representatives to fill out an evaluation form. The executive committee then meets with the director to discuss the collective evaluation form, compares the executive director's performance with annual work plan goal and outcomes, sets new goals and work plan outcomes for the coming year, and makes decisions on compensation and salary adjustments.”

“The executive director supervises the associate director and performs a similar evaluation of her efforts and makes decisions about her compensation and salary adjustments.”

“The organization makes its governing documents, conflict of interest policy and audited financial statements available to the public upon request.”

“The alliance for metropolitan stability (ams) was incorporated as a nonprofit organization under the laws of minnesota in 2000. Ams is a coalition of organizations advocating for public policies that promote equity in land use. Our mission is to support grassroots coalitions in campaigns for racial, economic and environmental justice in economic growth and land development decisions in the twin cities region. Ams was formed by a group of organizations that recognized that true stability for the twin cities could only be achieved through a comprehensive approach to regional problems. We have 34 member groups and dozens of allied organizations that unite under the recognition that our regions people, places and issues are interconnected, and that we can build more power by working together toward our shared goals.”

“We believe the people and places of our region are deeply connected and interdependent. We work to ensure that our regional investments like housing, transit and economic development benefit everyone, especially low-wealth communities, communities of color, new immigrant communities and the disability community - the people who are often left behind when resources are allocated. These communities have been historically excluded from land-use and project decision making tables, and we are working with public sector leaders to change that. The alliance brings grassroots organizations together to build more power and create a region that allows everyone in the twin cities region to thrive. In addition, we play a broader role in the regional landscape of advocacy and community-based groups by offering activities that help build the capacity of individuals and organizations that work for regional equity. For example, in 2016 we: o hosted shared learning sessions: the alliance launched a transformative equitable development series, a body of work which gives space for regional leaders and practitioners to share their experience and intentionally strategize on the ways in which we can anchor community-led, transformative equitable development in our region. More than 150 people attended eight sessions. O communicating best practices: produced a bi-weekly e-newsletter, the link, and published semi-annual print newsletters that offer the latest information and analysis on racial, environmental and economic equity issues o building the field: the alliance connects people and organizations to local and national resources around equitable development and tools for applying a racial and equity lens in our collective work. Efforts to build the capacity of community groups are paying off and new partnerships are emerging. Government entities are turning to grassroots community-based organizations as a source of knowledge for equitable development practices and building more authentic partnerships at the regional level. Our primary campaigns and projects in 2016 include: 1. Hire minnesota: a campaign working to end minnesota's racial disparities in employment and create career pathways for people of color in the construction trades. Hire minnesota has helped large public agencies like the minnesota department of transportation, local governmental authorities and the metropolitan council to increase the number of people of color and women in the workforce that builds our state's roads, bridges, stadiums, transitways and other major construction and infrastructure projects in the state and metro region. Hire's workforce projection tool is a key tool for success in meeting workforce goals. We've successfully used it on the central corridor lrt project, the saint's ballpark, mndot's franklin ave bridge project, and the vikings stadium. Due to the usage of the tool, all these projects have surpassed the status quo in their abilities to get close to, reach, or surpass the participation goals for people of color. Hire has continued to gain traction in the usage of the workforce projection tool in the field: minneapolis has included pieces of the tool in its pre-construction booklet and in the bidding documents for the nicollet mall project; st. Paul will use it on the 2700 university ave project; mndot will include pieces in its next workforce plans for contractors; and the met council will use it on both the green and blue line lrt extensions. The vikings stadium delivered exceptional workforce results: people of color worked 1.4 million hours on the project, totaling 37 percent of the total project hours (exceeding the original project goal of 32 percent hours worked by people of color). We project that this generated 41 million in wages for households of color in our region.”

“Our collaboration with metro transit on bus infrastructure improvements reflects these values: working with our community engagement team partners to ensure that local communities and bus riders shape and define plans for the equitable distribution of 275+ new bus stop shelters and to provide significant input into metro transit's transit service plan. Additionally, our efforts include facilitating equity collaboration between the community engagement steering committee and the metropolitan council; promotion of the equitable development scorecard tool (more than 120 government planners and community leaders from around the country have downloaded this document); advancing equitable development policies and budgeting for the swlrt project; supporting community exploration of the north minneapolis greenway concept; and supporting efforts to advance the transportation forward campaign and secure long-term funding for bus, rail and bike/pedestrian and other active transportation needs.”

“Equity in place is a diverse group of strategic partners from place-based, housing, and advocacy organizations. We believe that everyone in the twin cities region deserves to live where they wish to live and have access to opportunity. Our region benefits from many assets, but we continue to be unable to translate these benefits to everyone, specifically to communities of color. Equity in place engages community-based organizations in influencing planning and investments that will shape the future of the twin cities region. We also worked collectively to improve engagement processes surrounding a fair housing complaint issued by a few minneapolis neighborhood/community groups in partnership with the institute on metropolitan opportunity. Concerned that fair housing issues were being debated and might be resolved without meaningful input from communities of color, we successfully advocated for a fair housing advisory council (fhac) with community oversight, secured four seats for equity in place members on that committee, added other allies, built public sector alliances, and secured public funds for micro-grants to support the direct engagement of renters of color in defining the fair housing agenda in our region. Together we are shaping equity-driven investments, policies and plans; and we are changing the dynamics of community engagement by leading with community voices and with a race and class analysis.”

“These programs are funded largely by contributions from individuals, local and national foundations.”