SDG11 - Sustainable Cities and Communities Archives

Julius Ibrahim, Ending Homelessness with Heart, Head and Hustle

138, Julius Ibrahim, Second Shot Coffee | Heart, Head, and Hustle to end Homelessness

December 14, 2016 Tony Loyd

Julius Ibrahim is tackling homelessness one espresso at a time. In her book, Work on Purpose, Echoing Green alumni Lara Galinsky offers this formula: Heart + Head = Hustle By heart, she means your emotions. By head, she is referring to your skills and abilities. And by hustle…well, every entrepreneur knows exactly what that looks like. Julius Ibrahim is a beautiful illustration of heart, head and hustle. As Julius entered university in Central London, he was confronted daily by those who were sleeping on the sidewalk, in doorways or parks. These folks are referred to as “rough sleepers.” This was a significant “heart” moment for Julius. He wanted to apply…

120, Paul Bradley, ROC USA | Housing Security for Mobile Home Owners

November 2, 2016 Tony Loyd

ROC USA is a non-profit organization with a mission of making quality resident ownership possible nationwide. When Paul Bradley was studying economics in university, he became interested in cooperative business models. “It immediately appealed to me,” he told me. “By its structure, it’s a more broadly distributing form of business ownership. Resources are shared more broadly among workers, among members and among consumers of the cooperatives.” Paul was also interested in development work, spending time in Central America. When he returned to his home in Concord, New Hampshire, he found the opportunity to work in development work in his own neighborhood. He worked with the New Hampshire Community Loan Fund…

109, Clara Brenner, Urban Innovation Fund and Tumml | Creating an Ecosystem

October 3, 2016 Tony Loyd

Clara Brenner is creating a startup ecosystem for urban innovation. More than half of the world’s population now lives in urban areas. Globally, 512 cities have at least 1 million inhabitants. With urbanization comes unique challenges, from transportation to public health. To meet these challenges, entrepreneurs need a unique blend of business and political savvy. Clara Brenner and her co-founder Julie Lein are dedicated to solving core urban problems. Together, they co-founded the Urban Innovation Fund and also Tumml. Tumml is an accelerator whose mission is to empower entrepreneurs to solve urban problems. Their 33 portfolio companies have raised over $35 million in investments. They have created more than 300…

Disrupting Community Development with Alexandria Lafci

089, Alexandria Lafci, New Story | Disrupting Community Development through Story-Driven Crowdfunding

May 27, 2016 Tony Loyd

New Story is disrupting community development. They accomplish that through a story-driven crowdfunding process for building homes. But, they’re not just building houses, they’re creating communities. And, in the process, they are changing the donor experience. To explain all of this, we’re joined today by Alexandria Lafci, a cofounder and the head of operations for New Story. There’s so much to love about Alexandria and New Story. First, New Story is targeting communities one at a time. For example, they started in Leveque, Haiti where they moved 152 families from living under blue tarps, to living in lovely homes. And, by building that many homes, they were able to create a community….

076, Drew Meyers, Horizon | Building Empathy through Travel with a Trusted Network

April 27, 2016 Tony Loyd

Building empathy is the first step in becoming a changemaker. And what better way to build empathy than to travel? But not all travel is created equally. As it has been said, The World is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page. When you travel, you have choices of just how “local” the experience is. You can stay in a homogenous hotel chain, a local boutique hotel, stay in the home of a close friend, or even stay in the home of a stranger. You might want the most local and authentic experience possible, but how do you know whom to trust? Trust is the…

047, Sammie Rayner, HandUp | Social Good in Your Neighborhood

February 19, 2016 Tony Loyd

When it comes to social good, we often think we have to do something world-changing. In his book All the Trouble in the World, P. J. O’Rourke said Everybody wants to save the earth; nobody wants to help Mom do the dishes. If you think about it, that’s human nature. We love the grand gesture, the transformational speech or the disruptive technology. In the meantime, we pass homeless people on the street and we wonder what to do. I understand this feeling well. I’ve often been torn while thinking about how best to serve: do I give a homeless person cash, perhaps enabling them to practice alcoholism? Or, do I…

045, Francesco Piazzesi, Echale a tu casa | Housing As Community Development

February 15, 2016 Tony Loyd

Francesco Piazzesi uses housing as a means of community development. He grew up in the construction equipment industry. He noticed that the brick mason who spent his days building houses went home to a tin shack with a dirt floor. In many countries around the world, including Mexico, 2/3 of the houses built are built by the owners. The homeowners gather whatever materials they can afford and, step by step, over many years, they build their house. These houses are often not safe or sanitary and the vast majority have dirt floors. These houses also are not desirable, therefore, the homeowners do not build wealth to pass along to their…