Urban Black is committed to economic and social development. Our projects address the rapid displacement and lack of access to opportunity for historically marginalized communities. As the tide of gentrification continues to wave over our neighborhoods, People of Color – that have historically resided or owned businesses in urban areas – are finding it extremely difficult to remain. Retaining these communities, its institutions, and prized businesses is our number one priority.

In the selection of our projects and conceptual planning and programming development phase, we focus on three (3) main equity drivers as our anchoring considerations:

Advance Economic Opportunity

We consider integrated uses that promote economic opportunity. We carefully identify commercial businesses that create living wage jobs and have priority hiring policies. This includes ensuring that opportunity is provided to businesses owned by and employ people of color – more specifically, those of African American/Black/African, Native American, and/or Latinx/Hispanic origin.  

We select highly viable commercial uses from leading industry sectors. We understand that healthy, viable businesses provide jobs and sustainability for our projects and the neighborhood.

Our signature Legacy Program provides the opportunity for community investors to share in the financial wealth of our projects.

We initiate social policies and negotiate contracts with our partners that intentionally procure DBE/WMBE businesses for both key professional services including architectural, engineering, appraisal, consulting, legal, etc., and construction contracts. We are intentional about transferring the most valuable components of each project to persons of color (as measured by the monetary value of the contract and/or the highest-level professional role).

Build on Local Community Assets

Our projects preserve and build on existing community assets. We work with the owner to revitalize and transform the asset to cater to the future needs of the neighborhood. We are intentional when selecting projects. We aspire to make the greatest economic and social impact within marginalized communities in the Equitable Development Initiative, Opportunity Zones, and King County targeted areas.

Prevent Residential, Commercial, and Community Displacement

Our focus is retention, and as such, we enact several programs and practices to ensure we prevent displacement of historical residents, businesses, and institutions. We use the following practices: including, but not limited to:

Affirmative Marketing techniques both for our residential and commercial programs.

Utilization of our strong business network, social capital, and customer database that consist of contacts that meet our target demographic criteria.

Partnering with entities that have affirmative policies as part of their company strategy and are proven to be integrated into their day-to-day business practices.