2014 Topic: Investing in West Louisville’s Path to Prosperity
There is no more pressing community issue than the success of West Louisville to ensure that Louisville is a world-class city for all its citizens.
West Louisville poses a unique blend of assets and challenges. While home to 60,000 of the city’s residents and encompassing several historical neighborhoods, West Louisville lags behind the rest of the city in median household income, education attainment and home ownership.
Click to download the 2014 Bingham Fellows Graduation Report
The 44 community leaders who make up the 2014 Bingham Fellows class know that putting West Louisville on a “path to prosperity” is a complex task that takes more time and people than allotted in their program year. Nevertheless, it was clear from the start that this diverse group of social entrepreneurs felt charged with an important task.
As with every Bingham Fellows program year, the 2014 class is made up of local leaders with a broad knowledge base and range of experience on the topic. Some live in West Louisville; some work there; some are Louisville natives whose relatives grew up there; and some are transplants. Yet all came into this effort with the belief that Louisville Metro cannot be successful if one piece of it is ignored. There can be no “Possibility City” if the possibilities are not open to all.
UPS delivers grant to support Bingham Fellows work
The UPS Foundation generously invested grant funds in the 2014 Bingham Fellows class, helping bring this group together with scholarship support and enhancing their outcomes by providing start-up capital for their projects. A little competition is a great thing when it pushes us to run farther and faster, and the UPS Community Impact Challenge provided just that motivation for Bingham Fellows 2014. Their investment enabled the Leadership Louisville Center to increase critical feedback, improve accountability milestones, and create process improvements that resulted in a major upgrade to the Bingham Fellows experience. Thank you, UPS, for making a lasting difference to our community!
UPS announced at graduation that it will distribute $10,000 to one of the projects, OneWest.
The 2014 Bingham Fellows projects:
The Bingham Fellows narrowed their focus to projects which address three key elements of a thriving community: early childhood education, employment and the built environment.
Early Education 40210: Building Economic Prosperity through Early Childhood Education
The goal of Early Education 40210 is to increase early childhood education, specifically in the 40210 ZIP code area. This place-based effort will serve as a model for progress toward the community-wide kindergarten readiness goal of 77% by 2020. Read more
We Hire Together
Modeled after the Leadership Louisville Connector Project, We Hire Together will identify a network of on-the-ground West Louisville community connectors to inform West Louisville residents about hiring opportunities and connect them to existing workforce development and other employment resources. Read more
OneWest: A Catalyst for Prosperity
Envisioning an economic renaissance in West Louisville, this Bingham Fellows project focuses on the built environment – the physical surroundings and infrastructure where people live, work and play.
To that end, the Bingham Fellows are creating OneWest, a non-profit corporation that will establish new pathways to public and private capital – in Louisville Metro and beyond – in an effort to stimulate economic development and revitalization in an area key to the city’s overall success. Read more
About the Bingham Fellows
Bingham Fellows is the leadership-in-action arm of the Leadership Louisville Center. Created in 1988 through a $500,000 endowment from the Mary and Barry Bingham Sr. Fund, the Fellows are social entrepreneurs who have the imagination and talent needed to gather critical resources and create social change. Now in its 22nd year, the Bingham Fellows have had an impressive track record providing emerging issues with visibility and momentum.
The Fellows don’t ponder what might be. They roll up their sleeves, shine a spotlight on an issue and put new ideas to work. In recent years, they’ve contributed to the development of a long-term vision for our community, enhanced environmental responsibility through initiatives at the grassroots and policy levels, helped form the Kentucky Indiana Exchange, a regional leadership coalition. The impact of the Fellows goes back to the 1990’s with the creation of The Housing Partnership, construction of the Presbyterian Community Center, growth of local farmers’ markets and numerous other positive outcomes.
UPS Community Impact Challenge
The UPS Foundation generously invested grant funds in the 2014 Bingham Fellows class, helping bring this group together with scholarship support and enhancing their outcomes by providing start-up capital for their projects.
A little competition is a great thing when it pushes us to run farther and faster, and the UPS Community Impact Challenge provided just that motivation for Bingham Fellows 2014. Their investment enabled the Leadership Louisville Center to increase critical feedback, improve accountability milestones, and create process improvements that resulted in a major upgrade to the Bingham Fellows experience. Thank you, UPS, for making a lasting difference to our community!
