Twin Cities CDC Remakes and Markets Elm Street Area Neighborhood

By Ascala Sisk, Senior Manager
Neighborhood Stabilization
NeighborWorks America

Reposted from StableCommunities.org

Rebuilding and rebranding long struggling neighborhoods isn’t an instantaneous process. As our Stable Communities’ Neighborhood Marketing Program participants know, the work of redeveloping and marketing a neighborhood’s image –and making the substantive improvements that that image shift is built upon—takes time and dedication. This past week, I was excited to join Twin Cities Community Development Corporation, a NeighborWorks network organization, to celebrate another step towards success in these efforts.

On Tuesday, April 9th, I joined the Twin Cities CDC and local and national elected officials at a ribbon cutting in Fitchburg, Massachusetts, where a formerly blighted property has been turned into family-friendly housing. The event celebrated more than the rehabilitation of the seven-unit building, it highlighted the work that Twin Cities CDC has put into the slowly transforming the Elm Street Area Neighborhood, the focus of their neighborhood marketing efforts.

At the event, Congresswoman Niki Tsongas noted the catalytic effect these efforts have on their surrounding neighborhoods, saying, "Strong and healthy communities are built around high-quality and affordable housing…In Fitchburg and across the Commonwealth [of Massachusetts], strong public-private partnerships are helping to provide means and mechanisms for revitalizing our cities and towns.”

It is investments like those being made in Fitchburg that are adding strength to local real estate markets and bolstering community pride. I congratulate Executive Director Mark Dohan and the Twin Cities team for their hard work and terrific achievements and look forward to seeing how Twin Cities’ continued, targeted approach to revitalization transforms Elm Street and all of Fitchburg in the months and years ahead.

Read more about the event here.

Read more about NeighborWorks’ Neighborhood Marketing Program here.