ABOUT

Market Creek Plaza is a commercial and cultural center in San Diego and the first project of its kind in the United States to be designed, built and eventually to be owned by neighborhood residents. Its retail outlets include the first major grocery store in the area in over 30 years—Food 4 Less—the community's first sit-down restaurants (which are family-owned), a bank, and more conventional firms like Starbucks and Papa John's. The ten acres of property house a 500-seat open-air amphitheater, a restored creek and public art, including totems, paintings and mosaics. The low-income area in which the center is situated—the Diamond Neighborhoods—is home to a very diverse population of African-Americans, Latinos, African immigrants, Asian immigrant communities from Laos and the Philippines, as well as families from Polynesia.

ORIGIN AND MISSION

Market Creek Plaza was explicitly envisioned as an asset-building development strategy in the 1990s. Groundbreaking began in 1999 and the complex was completed in 2004. The $23.6 million project was spearheaded by a small family foundation, the Jacobs Center for Neighborhood Innovation. Established in 1995, JCNI focuses exclusively on working in the Diamond Neighborhoods.

JCNI connected with residents prior to conceptualizing the project by knocking on doors in the four communities surrounding the Langley property, which JCNI had purchased. The outreach teams conducted over 600 surveys in four languages coupled with cultural events to share food, dances and other traditions. This process led to insights around the need to address the area's food desert with a supermarket. Over 2,000 residents were involved in the planning and design process.

The $10 million construction of the center was centered around minority- or women-owned contracts—at $7.9 million, they comprised almost 80% of the budget. Within the temporary construction jobs, emerging contractors received training through the Mentor-Protégé program to improve their business skills to gain better access to contracts in open competition. JCNI provided these community-based contractors with loan guarantees for “working lines” of credit for to help them expand and upgrade their businesses. As these contractors paid off their credit lines, they became eligible for bonding.

JCNI also focused on capacity building and strengthening social and human capital: JCNI facilitates workshops, built up with outside expertise in curriculum development, on financial planning, asset building and preservation, with special outreach for women, youth and non-English speakers.

JCNI's IPO began in 2001 and took five years to involve 419 local investors in $500,000, which reflects 20% of the total capitalization. The majority of the community investors are female, educated, African-American, and homeowners.