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The Center assists with the development of and collaboration with existing national, regional and local coalitions that promote social transformation through community engagement. Some of the local coalitions the CSC’s currently collaborating with are the Lead Alliance, Bridges Out of Poverty, 4Community and the St. Joe Valley Project, which are all partnerships with business, government, education and community builders to create a more sustainable community.
Lead is an environmental pollutant that is hazardous for people of all ages, but is particularly harmful for young children whose nervous systems have not fully formed. Concern about lead poisoning began in the 1970’s with federal restrictions on lead content in fuel. Recent legislation has required local governments to monitor housing construction and renovation for lead-safe practices.
The Lead Alliance is a coalition formed in 2002 to address lead hazards facing children from low-income households in South Bend, primarily in the northeast neighborhood. The Alliance includes representatives from the city's Office of Economic and Community Development, Memorial Hospital, the Robinson Community Learning Center, the environmental assessment firm Greentree Environmental, and Notre Dame's Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and Center for Social Concerns. The group’s accomplishments include a chemistry course, published articles and conference presentations on its work, and the acquisition of a HUD Community Outreach Partnership Centers (COPC) grant with the RCLC.
While current prevention strategies appear helpful in the fight against lead poisoning, little is known about appropriate intervention techniques for children who have already been exposed. Children who test positive for lead exposure are more likely to come from families living in poverty and are therefore already at risk for developmental delay. April 26, 2006, the Center gave a Mini-Grant for a project intended to address this gap. Entitled “Get the Lead Out: Preventing Poisoning in America’s Youth,” the study is being conducted by Jody Nicholson, a Notre Dame graduate student in the department of Developmental Psychology, with guidance from faculty advisor Dr. John Borkowski, 2006 Ganey Award winner, in collaboration with the Lead Alliance.
This coalition of social service, community, government, education and business leaders is developing sustainable strategies to address poverty in the South Bend area. The Center partners with this group as it addresses the impact of generational poverty in the region by developing individual and systemic approaches to understanding economic diversity to build sustainable communities. One of the main tactics has been to draw in businesses, government and others who work on economic issues, but do not always see their connection to poverty.
The Center is a member of this coalition coordinated by the United Way of St. Joseph County. The purpose of this collaboration among community organizations is to address human service needs. Partners include representatives from business, education, social service agencies, government and faith-based organizations. Together this group is working to ensure that vulnerable populations are receiving efficient and coordinated support services, in specific areas like home heating. St. Joseph County Demographic Report
The St. Joe Valley Project is a coalition of community, labor, religious and environmental groups. Each year, Center staff members and students participate in an annual dinner put on by this group, highlighting its work for the year.
On April 26, 2006, the Center gave a Ganey Mini-Grant to a research project titled Economic Development in St. Joseph County: Improving our Quality of Life, to be conducted by Notre Dame economist Marty Wolfson and the St. Joe Valley Project, represented by its president, Greg Jones. This project will evaluate how economic development practices and policies of recent years have affected the South Bend community. Strategies used to attract businesses, geographic patterns of development, and tax subsidies are among those to be explored, to identify effects on, for example, local wage growth and the environment. Researchers hope that making such information public will enable environmentalists and other activists to take a greater role in local economic development processes, fostering enhanced responsiveness from policy makers.
