Entrepreneurship has the power to transform lives, build individual and community wealth, and catalyze positive change. New Haven is at an important inflection point; by boosting entrepreneurship and small business growth within under-connected communities, the community has the potential to undo structural inequities and remove the barriers to job creation.
Introduction
The New Haven Equitable Entrepreneurial Ecosystem (NHE3) was conceived by The Community Foundation (TCF) to build an equitable entrepreneurial ecosystem designed for historically marginalized entrepreneurs, such as those who identify as Black, Latinx, and women, in order to:
- Build individual and family wealth through financial independence
- Create community wealth and community power
- Build generational wealth
- Support structural change and remove barriers of structural racism; and
- Create jobs and economic sustainability
New Haven Equitable Entrepreneurial Ecosystem (NHE3)
The purpose of the New Haven Equitable Entrepreneurial Ecosystem (NHE3) is to convene leaders, community members, and entrepreneurs in implementing short-term infrastructure projects and devising a long-term strategic plan.
The two-year engagement in New Haven will be led by the NHE3 Council: a group that leads NHE3 implementation by providing guidance and making key decisions about this work. This team is supported by residents, NHE3 staff, TCF, the New Haven Innovation Collaborative (NHIC), local funding partners, and Forward Cities. The Council is designed to be an inclusive, diverse, multicultural, multisector group of leaders, activists, and entrepreneurs who are using this work to achieve more racial, gender, and economic equity.
The Council will work to:
- Identify key barriers to local entrepreneurial engagement.
- Develop community-fed solutions to overcoming these barriers.
- Implement these solutions in short-term pilot projects.
Lead Facilitators
NHE3’s team of local staff shall have the day-to-day responsibility of working with and supporting the NHE3 Council, the Forward Cities’ team, the funding partners, and the community for the creation and long-term sustainability of the ecosystem.
Arthur Thomas
Arthur Thomas
Arthur ThomasMr. Thomas is the Director of Entrepreneurial Initiatives and Inclusive Economic Opportunity for The Community Foundation for Greater New Haven. This role provides a platform for advancing cross-sector leadership collaboratives that create strategies for increasing equity and empowerment. Mr. Thomas recently graduated from a master’s program at Yale Divinity School to enhance his ability to evaluate the ethical outcomes of community empowerment programs, and build strategic partnerships to reduce socio-economic inequities in underserved populations. Prior to that, Mr. Thomas had a career in finance and residential real estate development. He also serves on the board of directors for Community Health Network, an organization that uses “Emotional Emancipation Circles” as a tool to address systemic and actual trauma in minority communities. Mr. Thomas is vocal about faith’s contribution to justice work. He is currently the co-chair of the Faith in Action outreach ministries at Christian Tabernacle Baptist Church, and is in the ordination process with the American Baptist Convention. Overall, Mr. Thomas is a healer at heart, and passionate about using innovation, real estate, and entrepreneurship as a treatment for disrupting the reproduction of poverty outcomes in under-resourced neighborhoods.
Margaret Lee
Margaret Lee
Margaret LeeMargaret Lee is a co-founder of Collab, a community-centered accelerator for Connecticut entrepreneurs and project builders. Before Collab, she was the Co-Director of Marketing at SeeClickFix, a New Haven civic technology startup that brings together neighbors and local government officials. Before that, she worked at the Yale Entrepreneurship Institute (now the Tsai Center for Innovative Thinking at Yale) where she managed Yale’s academic year and summer accelerators, seeing through more than 100 student and faculty ventures. In addition, she helped launch the pilot of the Social Venture Creation Program, an incubation program for social entrepreneurs. She has served as the Chair of the Board of the New Haven Innovation Collaborative and currently serves as Commissioner of the Economic Development Commission for the City of New Haven. She received the New Haven Biz Women in Business Award for her work.
Caroline Smith
Caroline Smith
Caroline SmithCaroline Smith is a co-founder of Collab, a community-centered accelerator for Connecticut entrepreneurs and project builders. Before Collab, she was the Co-Director of Marketing at SeeClickFix — a civic technology company that connects citizens with their local governments. She also founded New Haven Bike Month — an effort to build bicycle justice through neighborhood empowerment. Currently, she was elected the Chair of the Downtown-Wooster Square Community Management Team. She’s received the New Haven Biz Women in Business Award, Connecticut Magazine 40 Under 40, City of New Haven Individual Innovator Award, and Yale Seton Elm-Ivy Award for her work.
The Partners
New Haven Innovation Collaborative is an organization of entrepreneurs, researchers, and community builders focused on promoting, connecting, and enabling the ideas and talents that fuel the future of New Haven’s diverse innovation sectors, in life sciences, digital technology, and creative and cultural economies. Learn more about them here.
Forward Cities is a national nonprofit equipping communities and regions to grow and sustain more equitable entrepreneurial ecosystems. Forward Cities’ Community Entrepreneurship Accelerators (CEAs) place an equity lens on entrepreneurial ecosystems to ensure more access to resources is available to those with fundamentally sound business ideas. Learn more about them here.
Keep In Touch
Stay tuned by subscribing to CFGNH’s newsletter for announcements.
If you’d like to learn about how Forward Cities can engage your community, email Hassan Bazzi hbazzi@forwardcities.org