2006 Annual Report Executive Summary

This year, 2006, as anticipated, has been a pivotal year for Empower Lewiston (EL) as it has intensified its work laying the foundation for the transition from a grant-making entity to a stronger mission-driven organization. An 18-month organizational work plan was developed and has become the working document to address three primary areas---board development, funding diversification, and to conduct a scan of business models/business planning. As we embarked on the organizational work plan, we simultaneously engaged the technical assistance of our regional USDA-RD office to conduct a review of our Enterprise Community benchmarks to determine the current status and relevancy of each. Pleasantly, we discovered despite the ambitiousness of our EC Strategic Plan, many benchmarks have been addressed in some way by Empower Lewiston and/or its partners or other entities. The needs for a centralized furniture bank and increased transportation accessibility remain strong.

At the community level, we continued to devote our efforts to the primary focus areas identified last year—workforce development, literacy and higher educational attainment, financial literacy and personal asset building---while deepening our work at the neighborhood level. Empower Lewiston strengthened its partnership with Faithworks, an outsourcing company providing employment for those residents with poor work histories, limited work skills or need a flexible work environment or schedule.

EL’s Executive Director now sits on the Faithworks’ Board. From 2003-2006 (with 2006 estimated), Faithworks attracted sales of $4.4 million dollars, paid out $2.7 million dollars in payroll, and made more than $25,000 in Dept. of Health & Human Services (DHHS) payments—in the Enterprise Community, payroll and DHHS payments totaled more than $1 million dollars going back to low-income residents and their families.

Trying to impact the cycle of poverty, Empower Lewiston has sought to break the cycle with our young residents. With the successful USM-LA’s successful Lewiston Youth Empowerment Program, EL expanded its outcomes with the completion of a public in-ground skate park, development of the Junior Career Connection bringing educational & career aspirations together with financial literacy, adding a Youth Connection page to our newsletter, and distributing a monthly youth activity calendar of events for older youth.

This year, we were able to develop a stronger presence in the “Little Canada/Lincoln St.” section of the Enterprise Community. This neighborhood which also contains the newly renovated Franco-American Heritage Center is a tightly knit community with deep roots in Lewiston’s mill heritage. This raises EL’s visibility in that area and allows us to get more information and resources to these residents. This area is unique in that it is comprised of multi-unit apartment buildings and small single family homes sited on leased land. Due to the leased land aspect of housing, home owners are not eligible for conventional bank financing or rehabilitation housing programs. This creates challenges for committed home owners in maintaining their buildings, an important element of neighborhood health.

Although EL has been more fortunate as a Round II EC than Aroostook County’s Round III Empowerment Zone in receiving annual USDA allocations, the reductions have created challenges for the organization at this critical transitional time. Given the many positive inroads happening in the areas of workforce and economic development, it has also highlighted the impact of the IRS exclusion of tax credits for Round II Enterprise Communities, which would assist EL in moving the community forward at this time of peak promise.

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