Research & Data
Policy Solutions
Reinvestment Fund’s Policy Solutions team partners with government, philanthropic, nonprofit, and other civic leaders across the country to support strategic decision-making to strengthen communities. We conduct rigorous research and build analytic tools that help stakeholders implement effective interventions and address entrenched challenges to achieve more equitable outcomes. We use quantitative, spatial, and qualitative data analyses to understand communities, markets, and impediments to opportunity—and how investment and policy decisions can have the most powerful impact.
Putting Equity on the Map
A commitment to equity informs all of our work and is embedded in our methodologies and the products we develop with our partners across the country. By foregrounding the way key community assets are distributed across space, Policy’s work has long been at the leading edge of nationwide trends towards crafting interventions that meet the needs of diverse populations. These interventions are informed by commitments to equity across groups of individuals as well as equity across the places they call home.
Policy Solutions’ Market Value Analysis (MVA), Early Learning Access Analytics (ELA), and the Limited Supermarket Access Analysis (LSA) were all developed as tools to inform targeted investments in, respectively, housing opportunities, access to high-quality childcare and early learning programs, and access to fresh food in places that need these assets the most. We also have deep experience in evaluating and advancing fair housing objectives and applying frameworks of social wellbeing.
We focus on improving community assets that are essential to strong communities, including:
Affordable Housing
Healthy Food
Quality K-12 Education
Accessible Health Care
Jobs
Healthy Real Estate Markets
Effective and Practical Solutions
We create analytic tools and conduct evaluations that provide actionable information tailored to the needs of our partners. By combining rigorous data analysis with on-the-ground knowledge, Policy Solutions helps policymakers and funders strategically deploy capital and resources to build neighborhoods where all residents can thrive. Dozens of cities, counties and states across the country use our analyses to inform local policy and programs.
OUR PRODUCTS AND SERVICES INCLUDE:
- Analytic tools to guide public policy creation, implementation and impact assessment (including the MVA, ELA, and LSA).
- Highly-customizable, hyper-local, interactive displays presenting the results of advanced spatial-statistical analyses.
- Thought leadership and advisory services in support of comprehensive policy and investment strategies that identify local needs, craft interventions to address the most pressing challenges, and design methodologies to track and assess progress towards meeting short, medium and long terms goals.
- Rigorous, applied research and evaluation on topics including neighborhood stabilization and displacement mitigation, strategies to reduce evictions and foreclosures, access to homeownership opportunities, fair housing, and community social wellbeing.
Select Clients
Government
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PA Department of Banking
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PA Housing Finance Agency
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PA Department of Community and Economic Development
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PA Human Relations Commission
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NJ Department of Community Affairs
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NJ Housing and Mortgage Finance Agency
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State Banking Commissioner, DE
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City of Philadelphia, PA
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City of Wilmington, DE
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City of Baltimore, MD
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City of Pittsburgh, PA
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City of San Antonio, TX
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New Orleans Redevelopment Authority
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US Attorney for the Eastern District of PA
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Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia
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Federal Home Loan Bank of Pittsburgh
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Urban Redevelopment Authority of Pittsburgh/ Allegheny County, PA
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Northampton County, PA
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City of Akron, OH
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City of St. Louis, MO
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City of Kansas City, MO
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City of Dallas, TX
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City of Denton, TX
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City of Houston, TX
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City of Chattanooga, TN
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Nashville-Davidson County Metro Government, TN
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New Orleans Redevelopment Authority, LA
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Housing Authority of New Orleans
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Delaware State Housing Finance Agency
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PA Office of Child Development and Early Learning
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PA Attorney General’s Office
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NJ Attorney General’s Office
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U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development
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Institute of Museum and Library Services
Foundations
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Annie E. Casey Foundation
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Heinz Foundation
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Goldseker Foundation
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FB Heron Foundation
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Ford Foundation
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Jessie Ball DuPont Fund
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JPMorgan Chase Foundation
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Oak Foundation
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Open Society Foundations
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Rockefeller Foundation
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Surdna Foundation
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Wells Fargo Regional Foundation
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William Penn Foundation
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Abell Foundation
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Bainum Family Foundation
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Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation
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The Heinz Endowments
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Jessie Ball DuPont Fund
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Oak Foundation
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The Pew Charitable Trusts
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Regional Foundation, Philadelphia
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Richmond Memorial Health Foundation
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William Penn Foundation
Private and Nonprofit Institutions
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Brookings Institution
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National Development Council
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NeighborWorks America
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Opportunity Finance Network
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PolicyLink
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Success Measures
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The Cloudburst Group
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Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs
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Enterprise Community Partners
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Build from Within Alliance
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Community Legal Services (Philadelphia)
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Early Learning Coalition of Orange County (FL)
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Georgia Early Education Alliance for Ready Students (GEEARS)
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Grow America
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Housing Equality Center (PA)
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LISC
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Lincoln Institute of Land Policy
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National Consumer Law Center
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NeighborWorks America / Success Measures
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Regional Housing Legal Services (PA)