Community Benefits Resources provides assistance to community-led groups, coalitions, and public officials who want to improve the social, economic, and racial equity outcomes of development projects. We can help you:

Build your vision & prioritize goals

Work with our expert facilitators to build consensus and create shared priorities.

Research your community’s needs

– Quantitative and qualitative research and documentation.

– Neighborhood surveys and community meetings as tools to document community needs and priorities

Put law & policy to work

– Analyze potential community benefits, and equitable development policies, and legal strategies to meet your community’s needs, including legal research, representation, negotiation, agreement drafting, analysis, review, advice, consultation, and compliance.

Organize communities, workers, and coalitions 

– Strategies to broaden and strengthen your coalition

– Reach and engage residents, workers, and organizations in your community with an engagement strategy, using surveys, facilitated discussions, coalition workshops, and more.

Create a coalition strategy & message 

– Strengthen your coalition’s ability to think strategically as a group through understanding the proposed project; developing a power analysis of who makes decisions about the project;, creating a campaign work plan timeline;, and communicating a well-crafted message to the people who need to hear it.

Thanks to the generous support of several funders and donors, D4 and Sugar Law can assist some eligible community groups and coalitions in the Detroit area free of charge.

Fill out the form below to request support and tell us more about your needs

Who We Are 

The Community Benefits Resource Center is a collaboration between three organizations: The Sugar Law Center for Economic and Social Justice, Doing Development Differently in Metro Detroit (D4), and Coalitions, Campaigns, and Community Benefits (Cocacom). 

We believe racial equity, economic justice, and environmental sustainability must be an integral part of planning future development. Our neighborhoods are entitled to representation at the decision-making table, a fair return on our investment of public resources, and development that prioritizes people over capital. 

Our organizations have come together to support those who organize their communities for better outcomes from new development. We also hope to facilitate information sharing and collaboration among activists, educators, and policymakers who are changing the economic development model. 

For decades, the movement for equitable development has been surging across the country. We know of more than 350 campaigns in 125 cities! Will you join us? We see a future with vibrant, diverse neighborhoods where all our families can thrive. Together, we can make that happen.