Southern California is our headquarters and our sandbox.

We create innovative place-based solutions here to serve as case studies nationwide.

 

Case Study: Inland SoCal Advanced Manufacturing Initiative

Partners: California Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development (GO-Biz), California’s Manufacturing Network (CMTC), Center for Sustainable Energy, County of Riverside Office of Economic Development, Inland Economic Growth and Opportunity (IEGO), Inland Empire Labor Institute (IELI), Riverside College Community District, University of California Riverside Office of Technology Partnerships, University of California Riverside School of Public Policy, & Youth Action Project

In 2023 the U.S. Department of Energy issued a challenge to communities nationwide to coalesce around the goal of American reshoring and manufacturing. Aiming to strengthen our supply chain and create good-paying jobs in critical industries, the initiative is funded by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.

Blended Impact answered the call and quickly assembled a ten-party stakeholder group aiming to make the Inland Empire counties of Riverside and San Bernardino eligible to compete over the competition period in 2024-2025. To be competitive, teams must secure an MOU with a high-growth manufacturing company with community support at the end of the period. Heavily based around the Justice40 Initiative, Blended Impact will co-design and lead efforts around deep community engagement and robust business attraction efforts targeted to companies manufacturing in the approved sectors.

Case Study: Standardized Plans for Middle Income Housing

Partners: SCAG, the City of Riverside, & Parkview Legacy Foundation

In 2022 Blended Impact joined the Southern California Association of Government's Housing Policy Leadership Academy, a 10-session course that brings together local and regional thought leaders and community members to advance pro-housing policies across Southern California. The community of practice group of over thirty participants consisted of mayors, city council members, economic development managers, business leaders, housing advocates, and others across Riverside County, with similar cohorts for other SCAG communities occurring simultaneously.

After ten months of in-class sessions, prework, and group work, five groups presented the culmination research project and policy recommendations to the Lesar team and panelists. Our group presented the potential of standardized middle-income housing plans as a method to reduce soft costs to project sponsors, encourage development by emerging developers, increase housing diversity in infill lots, and reduce city approval times.

The direct target beneficiaries are intended to be renters in the 80-120% of Average Median Income brackets, who are currently underserved by public subsidies, and the indirect target beneficiaries are intended to be local, emerging developers scaling up to develop more units on infill lots.

After additional presentations to SCAG and WRCOG, the City of Riverside, Parkview Legacy Foundation, and Blended Impact elected to research the potential further.

 

Case Study: Opportunity Riverside

Partners: Accelerator for America, Center for Social Innovation at UCR, Inland Empire Community Foundation (IECF), Inland Empire Growth and Opportunity (IEGO), James Irvine Foundation, & Riverside County Office of Economic Development

Launched from 2020 to 2021, Opportunity Riverside was an initiative launched in partnership with the Riverside County Office of Economic Development to foster economic development in the county’s Opportunity Zones from the ground up, covering 14 cities and unincorporated areas. The county has the 3rd highest number of OZ census tracts in the state, making it a high priority.

Blended Impact worked to:

  • Educate stakeholders on what Opportunity Zones are and how investments can be structured to work for projects and communities

  • Source project and capital pipelines

  • Track the performance of projects within communities

 

Case Study: Opportunity Coachella

Partners: Accelerator for America, Center for Social Innovation at UCR, City of Coachella Economic Development Office, City Possible by Mastercard, Coachella Valley-OCIE SBDC, Greater Coachella Valley Chamber of Commerce, Mission Driven Finance, One i/e, Opportunity Riverside, Riverside County of Economic Development, Small Business Financial Development Corporation of Orange County, & SparkXYZ

Launched in April 2021, Opportunity Coachella was the City of Coachella’s first entrepreneurship and business attraction competition. City leadership wanted to focus on attracting businesses in clean energy, lodging, and recreation to the City’s Opportunity Zones and encourage local entrepreneurship.

Blended Impact managed the strategy, implementation, and reporting for this initiative from initial research and concept co-design to full execution.

In the four-week competition period, the website gained over 2,000 views nationally along with Coachella Mayor Stephen Hernandez being invited onto a Telemundo news segment to promote the initiative. The City’s Economic Development Office awarded $15,000 in prizes to businesses and residents and identified over $245 million dollars in economic development potential. See the case study for full details.