Economic & Workforce Development

OVERVIEW

The people of the Greater New Orleans area are creative, hardworking, and dedicated. Yet the region’s economic performance has been persistently below its potential, and too often residents are held back by failures in public education, the legacy of racism, and under-investment in workforce development.

Devastating hurricanes in recent years have battered the economy, causing costly damage to businesses and infrastructure and also spurring the relocation of major corporations and large employers. Further, the economic turmoil caused by the 2010 oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico demonstrated the perils of our region’s overreliance on too few industries.

We are committed to supporting new economic opportunities for our communities. We recognize that the social and economic health of our region depends on the creation of sustainable jobs, the development of innovative new industries, and strategies that connect residents with existing and emerging career opportunities. We also believe that collaboration across program areas is an essential part of economic and workforce development, coordinating economic opportunities with programs to improve workforce housing, transportation, and infrastructure.

Together with our national, regional, and local partners, we are helping to expand the minority middle class and build the capacity of small and disadvantaged business owners in the region. We also are working to transform the many lessons learned in community and environmental resilience into industries that can provide well-paying jobs for our residents and that can bring our region to the forefront of innovation.

OUR WORK

Our goals are to stimulate the regional economy and encourage greater investment in our workforce, better resiliency for traditional industries and the development of emerging industries. We seek to broaden career options, help people reach their full potential, and transform our region’s environmental challenges into economic opportunities.

We support innovation in this arena through:

Coastal 5+1
Our program addressing the most pressing challenges shared by our region’s five coastal parishes — St. Bernard, Plaquemines, lower Jefferson, Terrebonne and Lafourche — and the coastal-dependent Orleans Parish. Read More >>

Metropolitan Opportunities
An initiative of the Ford Foundation, this program enables us to help grantees build capacity and strengthen communities throughout the greater New Orleans region. Specifically the goals of this initiative are to connect people to opportunities for safe, affordable housing, efficient and effective transit, and to promote economic and workforce development in a holistic regional way.  Read More >>