The Northwest Side Community Development Corporation: transforming the approach to creating positive economic impact in distressed communities

From the late 1970s until about 2002,Milwaukee, Wisconsin, was home to a half dozen or so very active community development corporations – earnest organizations staffed with dedicated individuals who used federal and state funds to try to improve economically depressed neighborhoods by purchasing distressed properties, rehabilitating them, and then either selling or renting them to qualified, low-income families or local businesses. This effort mirrored what was happening in the rest of the country. According to a 2005 survey by the National Congress of Community.