Mission:
Allen Neighborhood Center (ANC) serves as a dynamic hub where Lansing Eastside neighbors access resources to improve their health and well-being; expand their capacity to seize job and entrepreneurial opportunities; create a strong sense of place, belonging, and community pride; and build a safe, sustainable, and thriving neighborhood.
Vision:
A diverse, equitable, and welcoming Eastside where a rich mix of neighbors enjoy access to everything they need to build an outstanding quality of life, a deep sense of belonging and community pride, and a strong voice in shaping a vibrant, sustainable, healthy future together.
Values:
- Empowerment and Engagement. ANC works to ensure all Eastsiders have a strong voice in shaping the organization’s decisions and programs. In turn, ANC’s community-crafted, community-driven programs are designed to give neighbors greater power to direct and shape their individual lives and the community’s future.
- Equity and Justice. ANC challenges itself to do its part to right our nation’s structural racism and other systemic injustices by working with our neighbors, particularly those most vulnerable, to secure the resources and advantages they need to fully and equitably enjoy the opportunities society offers.
- Diversity and Inclusion. ANC provides strong leadership to ensure the Eastside remains a place where people of every age, race, ethnicity, religion, nationality, housing and socio-economic status, sexuality, and gender identity feel welcomed and respected.
- Sustainability. ANC charts innovative paths to an environmentally sustainable, climate friendly future for the Eastside with the resilient food, housing, transportation, and economic systems the neighborhood needs to prosper long-term.
- Problem Solving. ANC is nimble, responsive, and creative. When new challenges emerge, ANC listens and collaborates with neighbors to identify effective responses and find the resources to implement them.
- Accountability. ANC programs are rooted in research and data. We assess our success in fulfilling our mission and living our values using qualitative and quantitative program metrics. However, the people of the Eastside ultimately determine if ANC is doing its job, serving its purpose, and benefiting the community.
Our 2021 – 2026 Goals and Objectives:
- Advance food self-reliance and strengthen the local/regional food system by increasing resident knowledge and skills in growing, preparing, and preserving food; enhancing health and nutrition awareness; offering job and entrepreneurship training in the culinary and food service industry; and building bonds of civic trust through an integrated and synergistic set of food-related programs.
- Create an equitable, sustainable, and attractive place to live, work, and play by enhancing Eastside public parks and green spaces; spurring balanced residential, commercial, and agricultural development; providing Eastside residents a meaningful voice in land-use planning and private development decisions; and modeling community innovations in clean energy and multi-modal transportation.
- Promote diverse housing options and community safety, stability and vibrancy by preserving the Eastside’s current housing stock through energy efficiency and related healthy-home investments; supporting and empowering home ownership; promoting quality affordable rentals; addressing aging-in-place challenges; emphasizing corridor improvement and in-fill development; and encouraging alternative housing models.
- Build an organizational culture that values diversity and is actively antiracist by explicitly and intentionally engaging residents whose voices don’t regularly inform ANC programming; expanding organizational partnerships to reflect the Eastside’s breadth of lived experience and expertise; creating individualized Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion strategies for each ANC program; and developing accountability measures to ensure ANC’s leadership represents the Eastside’s rich population mix by age, race, ethnicity, religion, nationality, housing and socio-economic status, sexuality, and gender identity.
- Engage Eastside neighbors in ANC’s work and link them to resources by continuing and expanding neighborhood communications and education programs; providing opportunities for neighborhood stakeholders to participate in assessment and planning for Eastside improvement; linking neighbors to food, housing, health, employment, and other human services and resources; creating new opportunities through Allen Place for residents and commercial stakeholders to connect and collaborate; and providing venues and occasions for people to gather and build community.
- Expand ANC’s capacity and effectiveness in serving the Eastside by building and broadening the organization’s financial base, wisely managing resources, continuously strengthening and diversifying staff and board leadership, fostering a positive and supportive workplace, and equipping the organization with technologies and other tools to maximize impact.