Opportunity Newark - Initiative for a Competitive Inner City

OpportunityNewark:
A Comprehensive Market-Based Initiative
Developing an economic agenda for Newark must be a top
priority for business and political leaders in the state of
New Jersey. Not only did Newark’s inner city unemployment
rate of 19 percent rank as the third highest inner
city unemployment rate in the nation in 2000, but 44 percent
of Newark children lived below the poverty rate in
2002. Fortunately, initiatives are already underway that
are addressing many of the challenges facing Newark. What
has been missing is an overarching market-based economic
strategy that integrates these efforts and strengthens
Newark’s competitive position in the region.
In 2004, the Newark Alliance partnered with the Initiative
for a Competitive Inner City (ICIC) to launch OpportunityNewark
(ON), a comprehensive economic development
effort designed to significantly increase jobs for Newark’s
inner city residents over the next five years. Founded in 1994
by Harvard Business School professor Dr. Michael E. Porter,
an international authority on strategy and competitiveness,
ICIC is a national nonprofit organization that works with
leaders across the country to help generate jobs, income and
wealth for low-income inner city residents.
Mission Statement: The mission of the
OpportunityNewark project is to enhance the
competitiveness of Newark as a business location
in key industry clusters and to retain and
generate sustainable jobs, income and wealthcreating
opportunities for low-income residents.
ICIC focuses on the private sector, because it is the primary
source of job creation. The real opportunity to create
change is to tap into the everyday decisions company leaders
make about markets, locations, hiring, sourcing and
investments. Generally, however, the private sector cannot
improve the economic conditions of inner city residents
on its own; the public sector must also create policies and
processes that encourage business growth and help private
organizations unlock the inner city’s significant economic
resources (see Fig. 10).
It is important to stress that this work is not a study, but
a results-driven process focused on action and change.
This project’s ultimate deliverable is the development and
implementation of a concrete economic agenda that is
broadly accepted by different sectors of the community.
Fig. 10: ICIC’s Approach Differs from Traditional Economic Development Efforts
Traditional Model
New Model
Reduce Poverty
Create Jobs and Wealth
Focus on Deficiencies
Focus on
Competitive Advantage
Need:
Social Services
Need:
Investment
Geographic Space:
Neighborhood
Geographic Space:
Region
Lead:
Government
Lead:
Private Sector
OpportunityNewark: Jobs and Community Development for the 21st Century 24