Your View is a recurring series of opinion pieces from members of The New Tropic community. To share your ideas, goals, and work about with the community in a Your View piece, please submit it to [email protected].
In Miami, we are no strangers to finding ourselves atop rankings that we can’t necessarily brag about.
Why? Well, our poverty rate, at 19.8 percent is way higher than the national average, 61 percent of renters spend more than a third of their income on housing and only the top 5 percent of earners are gaining in prosperity.
Not to mention that Miami is the third most expensive housing market in the U.S., which compounds this inequality and contributes to a growing “prosperity gap.”
It’s easy to point to these studies and throw our hands up in frustration. It is much harder to be the source of the solution. South Florida is home to some incredible, homegrown organizations aiming to tackle inequality head on.
It is our responsibility as a community to stand behind these leaders at the helm of the most promising solutions and support their growth.
With its inaugural Leadership Lab, that is exactly what Radical Partners and JPMorgan Chase & Co. set out to do. We identified seven of South Florida’s most innovative organizations and put them through an intensive leadership development journey focused on building powerful leadership teams, strengthening their organizational operations and scaling their impact.
Often, great leaders are so immersed in the community, that it is rare for them to have the support, time and space to step back invest in their own sustainability. As a community we have the ability to identify these outstanding leaders and invest in their growth and capacity.
Approximately one in five people in Miami live in poverty. The cost of living continues to outpace income levels. Instead of perpetuating this stark problem, let’s rally behind organizations leading the way to solutions – and tell their stories instead.
Roots Collective is shifting the economic paradigm in Miami’s low-income communities by championing local black-owned businesses through their monthly Black Marketplace.
The Ladies Empowerment Action Program empowers incarcerated women to start fresh after prison through a combination of educational, entrepreneurship training and essential life skills.
Maven Leadership Collective is a leadership development institute for queer and trans people of color that ensures that their voices are represented at the decision-making level, so that the entire community can benefit from their talents.
Miami Homes for All works to prevent and end homelessness in South Florida through outreach, advocacy, prevention and intervention.
The South Florida Community Land Trust builds and preserves affordable housing owned by communities, forever.
People Acting for Community Together trains and mobilizes leaders from diverse congregations, schools and community groups to build a powerful community voice and hold public officials accountable.
Urban Philanthropies enhances the economic independence and quality of life of distressed urban communities through business trainings for entrepreneurs in Overtown and a small business loan mechanism.
Each of these organizations provides renewed hope that we do indeed have the strategies we need to tackle these issues. It’s on all of us to identify issues that matter to the future of our city and to collaboratively support solutions that are making an impact. So let’s get moving: learn more about these organizations with these videos and donate, volunteer, join their boards, engage in their events, share their stories and let’s make sure the next headline is one we can be proud of.