Equitable Community Development

A mother and two young daughters with backpacks hold hands while walking on a sidewalk.

Transforming neighborhoods to improve health and wellbeing.

Community development helps create neighborhoods that enable residents to thrive where they live, learn, work and play.

RWJF believes every community in every ZIP code should be a place where the people there can live their healthiest lives. While there is no single vision for what a healthy community looks like, community development—the work of creating the conditions so all residents can thrive—is key to reaching this vision.

What happens when the health and community development sectors realize they’re working toward the same goal of enabling people to live their healthiest lives?

Watch this video to learn how the field of community development evolved in the past decade to help communities meet residents’ needs and address the effects of racism embedded in policies and practices.

The Future of Community Development

What are opportunities for the future of community development? We asked six experts.

Featured Initiatives

RWJF funds many initiatives to create opportunities that improve health equity. For this area of focus, these initiatives were selected to demonstrate grantmaking that is helping us achieve the greatest impact.

A daycare teacher playing with a group of young children outside.

Purpose Built Communities

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Center for Community Investment

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A medical professional talking with a woman holding an infant.

Healthy Neighborhoods Study

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Construction crew and community members review building plans by a pickup truck.

Build Healthy Places Network

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Community organizers talk while touring a neighborhood.

Third Space Action Lab

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Women and a baby in a stroller crossing the street.

Invest Health

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Three men smile while carrying on a conversation outside.

Partners for Rural Transformation

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Impact Investments for Community Development

The community development finance system (infographic)—made up of mission-driven lenders (infographic) is a main driver of capital for essentials like affordable housing, clean water, and small businesses that create jobs and generational wealth in communities that historically have experienced a lack of investment, especially communities of color and those with low incomes. Our impact investments and related grants focus on strengthening the community development finance system.

A woman operating a mobile kitchen bus at a farmers market.

Increasing Economic Opportunities—Supporting Financial Institutions

To boost financial opportunity in communities with economic and racial segregation, RWJF dedicated a $10 million investment to the Opportunity Finance Network for its Finance Justice Fund.

1-min read

Social Determinants of Health

Investing in Latino Communities

A $4 million investment from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to the National Association for Latino Community Asset Builders (NALCAB) will increase access to capital for Latino communities.

3-min read

Social Determinants of Health

Small stores and cars lining a town's main street.

Advancing Financial Inclusion by Strengthening Credit Unions

A $4 million guarantee from RWJF will increase Inclusiv’s capacity to provide capital to community development credit unions that serve communities of color.

1-min read

Social Determinants of Health

A green, fenced-in house on a street corner.

Increasing Investments in Underserved Communities

To increase investment to address the social determinants of health in low-income and communities of color, RWJF provided a guarantee of up to $10 million to the Community Investment Guarantee Pool.

2-min read

Social Determinants of Health Infrastructure & Energy

Residents plant edibles at a large community garden.

Creating Economic Opportunity in Central Appalachia

RWJF has made a $5 million investment in the Invest Appalachia Fund (IA Fund) to spur inclusive economic growth and health equity in Central Appalachia

2-min read

Social Determinants of Health Rural Health

Jóvenes SANOS led a healthy restaurant initiative that spurred the approval of an ordinance that requires new restaurants stations to offer and highlight healthy options. Santa Cruz is one of six winners of the inaugural RWJF Roadmaps to Health Prize.

Increasing Lending to Small-Business Owners of Color

The 10-year, $18 million guarantee will help development finance agencies in the United States remove some of the lending barriers experienced by people of color when seeking business loans, unlocking more capital to grow their businesses.

3-min read

Health Disparities

A mother sitting with young child drinking water in front of fireplace.

Improving Community Water Infrastructure

A $5 million loan from RWJF to Communities Unlimited, a nonprofit community development financial institution, is enabling them to provide loans to water utilities in seven Southern states.

3-min read

Public and Community Health Air and Water Quality

A family plays near a slide at a playground.

Improving Quality of Life in New Jersey Through Local Investment

A $4 million program-related investment from RWJF to the Local Initiatives Support Corporation will seed the creation of the New Jersey CDFI Capital Growth Fund, a program aimed at attracting funding from corporations and financial institutions to invest in small, New Jersey–based CDFIs and similar entities that prioritize hyper-local lending to meet community needs.

3-min read

Social Determinants of Health New Jersey

Three adults surveying and planning land to be developed.

Catalyzing Finance for Racial Equity

A $5 million loan from RWJF to the Nonprofit Finance Fund supports programs in N.J. to better enable organizations focused on racial equity to acquire, develop, rehabilitate, and operate affordable housing and community facilities in communities that historically have experienced a lack of investment.

2-min read

Social Determinants of Health New Jersey Housing

Three people walking away from a large, teepee-shaped brick building.

Supporting the Indigenous Finance System on the Mountain Plains

An RWJF loan will support the Mountain Plains Regional Native Coalition’s efforts to shift the paradigm of community development finance by creating equitable systems of capital and resource allocation and building resilient Native economies.

4-min read

Economic Inclusion for Family Wellbeing Policy and Law Structural Racism

A man and young boy stand together outside smiling.

Increasing Community Resilience for Climate-Related Events

Green infrastructure, like parks, street trees, and shrubs on rooftops, improves air quality, reduces flooding and heat islands, improves water quality, and promotes community resilience in the face of extreme weather.

2-min read

Public and Community Health Policy and Law Climate Change & Climate Action

Resources from Grantees

Residential Segregation and Health: History, Harms, and Next Steps

Public Policies to Address Residential Segregation and Improve Health

Related Content

Blog Post

What Does Antiracist Community Development Look Like in Practice?

An antiracist paradigm for community development along with actions by investors, government, and philanthropy can move the U.S. toward more racially just financing.

4-min read

Equitable Community Development Policy and Law Structural Racism

Blog Post

Who Finances Healthy Communities?

When people establish roots, make friendships, raise families, and participate in activities like volunteering or mentoring, a place becomes a community.

5-min read

Equitable Community Development

Regulatory Comments

Comments on Information Sharing between the IRS and Census.

Information Sharing Between IRS and Census

RWJF offers its strong support for the 2024 Proposed Rule, which authorizes the IRS to expand the disclosure of Federal Tax Returns and Return Information to the Census Bureau.

4-min read

Health Disparities Policy and Law Family and Social Environment

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Infrastructure

Promoting health equity through public infrastructure is a critical step toward creating communities and regions where all residents may participate in, and benefit from, decisions that shape the places they call home.

1-min read

Infrastructure & Energy

A father and son walking on a sidewalk while a bus passes by.

Impact Investing

Impact investing expands our toolkit and builds on our decades-long work changing systems and policies to improve health, especially for those facing the greatest obstacles.

2-min read

Health Disparities

A community leader speaking at a neighborhood gathering.

Building Community Power

RWJF supports research and organizing to increase grassroots capacity to shape conditions for healthier communities, especially in low-income communities and communities of color.

1-min read

Public and Community Health Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Community Power

Equitable Community Development

The Future of Community Development

Featured Initiatives

Purpose Built Communities

Center for Community Investment

Healthy Neighborhoods Study

Build Healthy Places Network

Third Space Action Lab

Invest Health

Partners for Rural Transformation

Impact Investments for Community Development

Increasing Economic Opportunities—Supporting Financial Institutions

Investing in Latino Communities

Advancing Financial Inclusion by Strengthening Credit Unions

Increasing Investments in Underserved Communities

Creating Economic Opportunity in Central Appalachia

Increasing Lending to Small-Business Owners of Color

Improving Community Water Infrastructure

Improving Quality of Life in New Jersey Through Local Investment

Catalyzing Finance for Racial Equity

Supporting the Indigenous Finance System on the Mountain Plains

Increasing Community Resilience for Climate-Related Events

Resources from Grantees

Residential Segregation and Health: History, Harms, and Next Steps

Public Policies to Address Residential Segregation and Improve Health

Related Content

What Does Antiracist Community Development Look Like in Practice?

Who Finances Healthy Communities?

Information Sharing Between IRS and Census

Infrastructure

Impact Investing

Building Community Power

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