Laverne Gardner's Contact Details

Laverne Gardner's Company Details

Insight Center for Community Economic Development

Oakland, California, US • 18 Employees
Public Safety

The Insight Center for Community Economic Development is a national research, consulting, and legal organization dedicated to building economic health in vulnerable communities. The Insight Center’s mission is to help people and communities become, and remain, economically secure. We believe that the pathway to sustainable growth for our country and its people lies in strengthening our most vulnerable and economically detached populations. The Insight Center envisions a nation where all people have access to the resources, opportunities and support they need to help them realize their potential and achieve economic security. We envision a nation of individuals and families with sufficient income, quality education, decent and affordable housing and health care, child and elder care, a safe environment, and savings and other economic assets. We see a society that recognizes the value, dignity and creative potential of the overlooked and underappreciated. Success on this scale will make us all richer and is the moral thing to do, consistent with the values of our democracy. The most compelling argument for investing in vulnerable people and communities is an economic one: greater levels of inclusion will increase individual, community and national productivity. Greater inclusion creates a virtuous cycle whereby economically healthy communities attract entrepreneurs and other employers who provide good wages to well-educated workers. In turn, those workers are able to attain economic security and reinvest in the continuing improvement of their schools and neighborhoods.