The University of Massachusetts Amherst

Category: Creative Economy/Springfield Initiatve

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Creative Economy/Springfield Initiatve Events Social inequality & justice Springfield Initiative

Wellspring’s Upholstery Co-op Stitching Together a Brighter Springfield

Earlier this week, Artwain Davis and Alex Guevara stripped vinyl from banquet hall booths. It was one step in the revitalization of not just the booths, but also the city of Springfield, Mass. (To see more photos from the event, like CPPA on Facebook.)

Davis and Guevara work at the Wellspring Upholstery Cooperative, a new South End business that’s located on Main Street in the Monkey Wrench Building, where that tool was born. But the co-op isn’t your typical upholstery shop. It’s part of the Wellspring Collaborative, a creative economic development project that draws on the purchasing power of the area’s largest employers and anchor institutions to provide a market for new, worker-owned companies.

Fred Rose, a lecturer at the Center for Public Policy and Administration, conceived of and directs the Collaborative. He has put together a broad coalition of the region’s largest employers, as well as community and business leaders from throughout the Pioneer Valley. Many of these leaders joined Springfield Mayor Domenic J. Sarno at a ribbon-cutting ceremony this week at the upholstery shop, Wellspring’s first business.

Wellspring Co-Director Emily Kawano explained the concept at the heart of the Collaborative’s economic development plan: “Income is usually not enough. The difference in having a stable lifestyle is having some assets.”

That’s why employees at the upholstery shop will have the opportunity to become worker-owners after a year on the job. Having a financial stake in the company will not only provide employees with much-needed assets. It will also make the shop itself a more stable and viable business.

“Worker cooperatives have a much higher survival rate,” said Mary Hoyer, from the Cooperative Fund of New England. “Their services and products tend to be of a higher quality because of worker pride.” And because they are owned by people in the community, she added, co-ops as a rule don’t close up and move to where rent is cheaper.

The co-op is just one aspect of the Wellspring upholstery shop that anchors it in the Springfield community. It also has partnerships with the Hampden County Sheriff’s Department and a veteran Springfield upholsterer. The sheriff’s department has run an upholstery training program in the county jail for several decades. By partnering with the sheriff, the Wellspring co-op has access to a pool of potential employees who already have some training and often are in need of a job upon release from jail. The co-op’s other partner, Alliance Upholstery, is an established Springfield business with more than 40 years of upholstering experience and a fully equipped shop, where the Wellspring co-op is located. Alliance’s owner, Evan Cohen, is managing Wellspring Upholstery and training the incoming workforce.

Wellspring’s upholsterers have already completed jobs for the Berkshire Dining Hall at UMass and the Westfield, Mass., mayor’s office. Rose said he hopes that the partnerships the Wellspring Collaborative has developed with the region’s anchor institutions will yield further upholstery contracts.

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Creative Economy/Springfield Initiatve Events

Wellspring Upholstery Co-op Launches Next Week

The Wellspring Collaborative officially launches its first cooperatively owned Springfield business on Wednesday, March 26 at 10:30 a.m. All are welcome.

Springfield Mayor Domenic J. Sarno will be on hand for the formal opening of the Wellspring Upholstery Cooperative, at 141-143 Main St. Charles H. Ruck, former executive director of Springfield Neighborhood Housing Services, will host the ribbon-cutting ceremony, and Frank Robinson, executive director of Springfield’s Partners for a Healthier Community, will offer opening remarks before lunch and a panel discussion on cooperative business development.

The new South End business is partnering with the Hampden County Sheriff’s Department and a veteran upholsterer to provide training and support for new worker-owners. The upholstery cooperative plans to employ six Springfield residents in its first year and expects to double in size within six years.

“This shop is providing much-needed jobs for low-income Springfield residents,” says Fred Rose, Wellspring Collaborative’s director and lecturer at the Center for Public Policy and Administration. “I’m excited to see the Collaborative take the first public step in our far-reaching economic development plan to create a network of locally owned businesses in some of this city’s poorest neighborhoods.”

The Wellspring Collaborative is modeled on the Evergreen Cooperatives in Cleveland and the Mondragón Corporation in Spain. Evergreen, like Wellspring, draws on the purchasing power of the area’s largest employers and anchor institutions to provide a market for new, worker-owned companies. So far the upholstery co-op has performed contracts with the University of Massachusetts Amherst, the Westfield, Mass., mayor’s office and local banquet facilities.

The sheriff’s department has run an upholstery training program for several decades in the county jail. By partnering with the sheriff, the Wellspring co-op has access to a pool of potential employees who already have some training and often are in need of a job upon release from jail. The co-op’s other partner, Alliance Upholstery, is an established Springfield business with more than 40 years of upholstering experience and a fully equipped shop, where the Wellspring co-op is located. Alliance’s owner, Evan Cohen, is managing Wellspring Upholstery and training the incoming workforce.

“We’re incredibly lucky to have the partnerships we do. By starting off with an operational workspace and an established vocational training program, our business is already sitting on a firm foundation,” Rose says. “The co-op is actively working to build our customer base and increase employment, so if you have any upholstery needs either at home or in your workplace, please call (413) 731-7857.”

Going forward, the co-op will look to capitalize on the Wellspring Collaborative’s relationships with area anchor institutions to secure upholstering contracts. Baystate Health, Sisters of Providence Health System, Mass Mutual, UMass Amherst, Western New England University and Springfield Technical Community College are among the 22 anchor institutions, community groups and development partners currently affiliated with the Wellspring Collaborative.

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Creative Economy/Springfield Initiatve Springfield Initiative

Springfield Project Receives Merck Grant for Urban Greenhouse

The John Merck Fund has awarded a $45,000 grant to the Wellspring Collaborative, the innovative economic development project in Springfield co-directed by Fred Rose, lecturer at the Center for Public Policy and Administration.

This one-year grant will support research and planning for a large-scale production greenhouse in Springfield that will grow and sell food to local anchor institutions such as hospitals and schools.

“Institutional food purchasers are seeking local produce in response to a number of pressures, which is creating an unmet demand for year-round greenhouse production,” said Rose. “Health care professionals, educators and members of the public are all paying closer attention these days to nutrition, recognizing that our eating habits are a critical element in addressing epidemic levels of obesity, diabetes and heart disease.”

The proposed greenhouse aims not only to improve nutritional options at Springfield-area hospitals and other institutions, though. It will also be a cooperatively owned for-profit business that will provide job training and employment to city residents.

Wellspring is modeled on the Evergreen Cooperatives in Cleveland and the Mondragón Corporation in Spain. These organizations draw on the purchasing power of their area’s largest employers and anchor institutions to provide a market for new, worker-owned companies. The Wellspring Collaborative currently comprises 22 anchor institutions, community groups and development partners, including Baystate Health, Sisters of Providence Health System, Mass Mutual, UMass Amherst, Western New England University, and Springfield Technical Community College.

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Creative Economy/Springfield Initiatve Social inequality & justice Springfield Initiative

New Course Examines Springfield and U.S. Urban Transformations

Students interested in urban economic development should consider taking a new course offered by the Center for Public Policy and Administration in the fall. “Strategies for Change: Springfield and the Transformation of Urban America” (PUBP&ADM 597S) is open to graduate students and upper-level undergraduates alike.

Instructor Fred Rose served as a community organizer in Springfield for 15 years with the Pioneer Valley Project, a faith-based organizing coalition. He now co-directs the Wellspring Collaborative, a community development project creating worker-owned companies that provide living-wage jobs in Springfield, Massachusetts’ third largest city.

As the birthplace of the lathe, and one of the first cities to manufacture and use interchangeable parts in assembly-line production, Springfield played an important role in the Industrial Revolution. But changes in the city’s population and in the national and global economy have left many of Springfield’s once-vibrant mills and neighborhoods shadows of their former selves.

Today, Springfield provides both a microcosm of challenges facing older industrial cities across the country and a rich array of community change efforts that engage diverse issues and social actors. In “Strategies for Change,” students will engage with diverse leaders from across the social spectrum and critically examine their strategies to improve conditions of poverty and inequality in Springfield.

Rose will use his experiences working in Springfield to help ground class discussions in an analysis of the changing cultural, economic and political context of the city. He will then compare Springfield with other cities across the country that have confronted similar economic transformations.

“Strategies for Change” meets Tuesdays and Thursdays from 1 to 2:15 p.m. in Machmer W-13.

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Creative Economy/Springfield Initiatve Faculty Research Springfield Initiative

CPPA Faculty to Speak During Feb. 7 Springfield Panel

Two CPPA faculty members will participate in a panel called “Social Science Research in Springfield,” next Thursday, Feb. 7 at 11:30 a.m. in the Amherst Room of the Campus Center.

The panel is hosted by the Institute for Social Science Research and aims to highlight the work of three social scientists from the University of Massachusetts Amherst who are conducting research through public engagement projects in Springfield, Mass. Panel members are: Associate Professor Sylvia Brandt (resource economics and public policy); Assistant Professor Frank Sleegers (landscape architecture); and Lecturer Fred Rose (public policy). Together, these panelists will address the needs and strengths of the city and share their visions of how the current partnership between UMass and Springfield might continue to grow.

That partnership was formalized in 2010, when officials from UMass and the City of Springfield agreed to promote collaborations that will lead to the revitalization of the city’s economy. The goals of the partnership include positioning the city in the long term as a center for environmentally beneficial green industries; boosting the city’s arts and creative economy; and expanding relevant university teaching and outreach initiatives.

Each of the panelists has first-hand research experience in Springfield. Brandt has looked at the health costs of pollution in this densely populated urban area. Rose co-directs the Wellspring Collaborative, an economic development project that aims to strengthen the area’s local economy by channeling the purchasing power of the city’s largest employers through new worker-owned businesses in Springfield neighborhoods. Sleegers works to bring public art and green spaces to Springfield neighborhoods.

This event includes lunch. The event is free and open to the public, but to reserve your spot, please RSVP to Karen Mason by February 3.

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Creative Economy/Springfield Initiatve Grants Social inequality & justice Springfield Initiative

Wellspring Initiative Keeps Growing

The Wellspring Initiative, the Springfield economic development project led by the Center for Public Policy and Administration (CPPA) and the Center for Popular Economics (CPE), has received a $12,000 grant from the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts.

This is the third award the initiative has received so far this academic year. The funding will pay for the research and planning needed to move the initiative from a concept into a reality.

Wellspring is coordinating with the region’s largest employers to identify key areas where the purchase of goods and services could be shifted to new worker-owned businesses in Springfield neighborhoods. These businesses would provide entry-level jobs and valuable skills to unemployed and underemployed city residents. Worker-owned businesses would not only offer inner-city residents the opportunity of steady employment; they would also help revitalize Springfield, one of the poorest cities in the United States.

This winter, Wellspring partners plan to identify the first of three business models to pursue. The Community Foundation grant will support Wellspring’s market research into the type of cooperative businesses that would be most likely to succeed in Springfield.

The Wellspring Initiative was one of 86 projects to receive funding from the Community Foundation in 2011. This award comes through the Community Foundation from the Eugene A. Dexter Charitable Fund administered by Bank of America, Trustee.

CPPA is the hub of interdisciplinary public policy research, teaching and engagement at UMass Amherst. Its faculty and alumni are effective policy leaders, from the local to the global levels, in addressing topics such as family and care policy, environmental issues, emerging technologies, social inequalities and governance. The CPPA program is the 2011 recipient of the National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration’s Social Equity Award, created to honor a public administration, affairs or policy program with a comprehensive approach to integrating social equity into its academic and practical work.

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Creative Economy/Springfield Initiatve Grants Springfield Initiative

CPPA Furthers Economic Development Project in Springfield

The Center for Public Policy and Administration (CPPA) at the University of Massachusetts Amherst is collaborating with Springfield-based Partners for a Healthier Community on an economic and community development project funded through a two-year $200,000 grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno and representatives from Gov. Deval Patrick’s office were on hand Tuesday, December 13, when CPPA and Partners for a Healthier Community announced the award and officially kicked off the next phase of the project. 

The project, called the Wellspring Initiative, aims to create entry-level jobs and improve living conditions in several Springfield neighborhoods. Wellspring will use the two-year Robert Wood Johnson Foundation grant, along with matching local funds, to create a worker-owned company and to establish the infrastructure for a network of additional companies with a cooperative organizational structure.

CPPA lecturer Fred Rose is the UMass project director responsible for coordinating the Wellspring Initiative. He will oversee research about three potential businesses, which will include assessing the economic viability of each business and developing a business plan for each of the three. Rose will work with existing local organizations to ensure strong support for the new cooperatively owned businesses.

“Springfield has had difficulty attracting jobs to the area, and is among the poorest cities in the United States,” said Rose, who served as the staff director and lead organizer at the Pioneer Valley Project before coming to CPPA. “The Wellspring Initiative will create new community-based jobs in inner-city Springfield by tapping into the purchasing power of local anchor institutions like colleges and hospitals, which are the region’s largest employers. Together, these institutions purchase more than $1 billion in goods and services each year, but less than 10 percent of that money is spent within Springfield.”

Wellspring is coordinating with the region’s largest employers to identify key areas where the purchase of goods and services could be shifted to new worker-owned businesses in Springfield neighborhoods. These businesses would provide entry-level jobs and valuable skills to unemployed and underemployed city residents.

“The Wellspring Initiative is offering a creative approach to a deep-rooted problem,” said CPPA Director M.V. Lee Badgett. “We’re excited that CPPA is working closely with institutions and organizations throughout the region to strengthen Springfield’s neighborhoods, institutions and economic outlook.”

Badgett and Rose both recognize the value of collaborating with Partners for a Healthier Community, an organization with a mission to address overall health in Springfield through civic leadership, collaborative partnerships and advocacy. CPPA and Partners for a Healthier Community will also join forces with Western New England University, the Pioneer Valley AFL-CIO, Massachusetts Higher Education Consortium, Michael Kane Consulting, Third Sector New England, the Pioneer Valley Project, Jobs with Justice, and Common Capital (formerly the Western Massachusetts Enterprise Fund).

Partners for a Healthier Community was one of only 12 community-based organizations across the country to receive a Roadmaps to Health grant this fall from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The grants went to coalitions that are addressing community health from a broad perspective, incorporating factors such as education, jobs creation and improving the environment in their efforts to develop and sustain healthy people and strong communities.

CPPA is the hub of interdisciplinary public policy research, teaching and engagement at UMass Amherst. Its faculty and alumni are effective policy leaders, from the local to the global levels, in addressing topics such as family and care policy, environmental issues, emerging technologies, social inequalities and governance. The CPPA program is the 2011 recipient of the National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration’s Social Equity Award, created to honor a public administration, affairs or policy program with a comprehensive approach to integrating social equity into its academic and practical work.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation focuses on the pressing health and health care issues facing our country. As the nation’s largest philanthropy devoted exclusively to health and health care, the Foundation works with a diverse group of organizations and individuals to identify solutions and achieve comprehensive, measureable and timely change. For more information, visit www.rwjf.org.

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Creative Economy/Springfield Initiatve Events

Howard Highlights Cleveland’s Evergreen Cooperatives

On November 16th and 17th, CPPA hosted Ted Howard to talk about the development and launch of the Evergreen Cooperatives, a business initiative aimed at creating living wage jobs and building wealth in downtown Cleveland. While here, Howard — who founded The Democracy Collaborative at the University of Maryland and is now a senior fellow at the Cleveland Foundation — gave two public talks about Evergreen and met with a group of stakeholders in Springfield about the possible utility of the model for that city.

Today, the Evergreen Cooperatives include a $5.7 million state-of-the-art green laundry, a solar installation company, a community newspaper, and a multi-block hydroponic greenhouse aimed at providing farm fresh produce to food retailers, wholesalers, and food service companies. The Evergreen model aims to revitalize a local economy from the “ground up,” creating living wage jobs that also help to build wealth and assets in local communities. A video about the Evergreen Cooperatives is available on YouTube here.

Howard was recently named by Utne Reader as one of the “Top 25 Visionaries Who are Changing Your World.” Howard and the Evergreen Cooperatives were also recently featured on the PBS documentary, “Fixing the Future.”

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Creative Economy/Springfield Initiatve

Springfield Initiative’s New Blog

The Springfield Initiative now has a blog! Visit http://www.masspolicy.org/springfield/ for more details.

Led by Fred Rose, lecturer for the Center for Public Policy and Administration, the Springfield Initiative provides a bridge between university research and resources and city residents working to make their lives and communities better. Its focus is on strategies to improve the lives of marginalized communities as an integral part of improving the prosperity of cities and regions.

As a university-community partnership, the Initiative will respond to research and development needs and priorities from the community, and initiate its own projects around issues of critical importance and potential. The Intiative has the ability to act as a convener of stakeholders, to bring rigorous research and theoretical perspectives to development processes, and to inform local initiatives with best practices.

Recently, the Initiative hosted “Cleveland’s Evergreen Cooperatives: Is This a Model for Springfield?”. The program is being developed with a Creative Economy grant from the President’s Office.

For the most up-to-date information on the Initiative and its events, visit the Springfield Initiative’s news blog.

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Creative Economy/Springfield Initiatve Events

Cleveland’s Evergreen Cooperatives Focus of Talk about Springfield Job Creation

?The Center for Public Policy and Administration will host a talk on Tuesday, November 16, from 2:30-4 p.m. in Gordon Hall about the potential of Cleveland’s Evergreen Cooperatives for creating jobs and building economic democracy in other U.S. cities, including nearby Springfield.

The talk, “Cleveland’s Evergreen Cooperatives: Is This a Model for Springfield?,” is also sponsored by the Center for Popular Economics, the Pioneer Valley Project, the Political Economy Research Institute, the Department of Economics, Western Massachusetts Jobs with Justice, and the Labor Center.

Two architects of the Evergreen initiative, Ted Howard and Jim Anderson, will be the featured speakers at the talk.  Howard is the founder and executive director of The Democracy Collaborative, a project at the University of Maryland, and was recently appointed as the Steven Minter Senior Fellow for Social Justice at The Cleveland Foundation.

Anderson is the program coordinator for the Ohio Employee Ownership Center, an initiative at Kent State University, and business manager of the Evergreen Cooperative Laundry.

Howard and Anderson will talk about the philosophy and founding of the Evergreen Cooperatives, which began when several downtown Cleveland anchor institutions—including a hospital, a university, a community foundation, and a local bank–worked with the surrounding low-income community to help launch a number of worker-owned businesses.

Today, the Evergreen Cooperatives include a $5.7 million state-of-the-art green laundry, a solar installation company, a community newspaper, and a multi-block hydroponic greenhouse aimed at providing farm fresh produce to food retailers, wholesalers, and food service companies.

The Evergreen model aims to revitalize a local economy from the “ground up,” creating living wage jobs that also help to build wealth and assets in local communities.

A video about the Evergreen Cooperatives is available on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gt_ZHUDhKjs.

Howard and Anderson will also speak at a public forum from 7-8:30 p.m. on November 16 at Christ Church Cathedral (35 Chestnut Street) in Springfield.

Both the UMass and Springfield events are open to the public.  For additional information, contact Fred Rose (frose@pubpol.umass.edu) or Emily Kawano (Emily@populareconomics.org).