Giving Compass' Take:

• In this Medium post, author Elizabeth Eagen discusses an initiative in Cincinnati called People's Liberty, which delivers small grants to support urban experimentation and innovation.

• People's Liberty shows how big ideas can start small and the way change develops from a single city block. How can other local organizations learn from this example?

• Here's how cities are becoming the new laboratories of democracy.

As far as place-based initiatives go, People’s Liberty feels a world away from traditional philanthropic efforts to invest in cities. Set up by the Haile Foundation, People’s Liberty occupies offices in the center of Cincinnati’s Over-the-Rhine neighborhood. It was founded as a “philanthropic lab that brings together civic-minded talent to address challenges and uncover opportunities to accelerate the positive transformation of Greater Cincinnati.”

I had a chance to discuss PL’s process, values, and aims with CEO Eric Avner, who laid out the metrics in broad strokes:

Have we made a difference in the lives of people in greater Cincinnati? Have we empowered individuals? Are we learning and leveraging so that others, outside of our organization, can learn too?

PL gives three types of grants. Project grants, selected twice yearly, give individuals $10,000 for project-related costs, workspace and professional support for preliminary brand and story components to implement innovative community development. Globe Grants give teams or individuals $15,000 to take over one of two storefronts to transform it into an interactive experience engaging the surrounding neighborhood. And two Haile Fellowships of $100,000 a year provide a year-long “civic sabbatical” to research, plan, implement and present a big idea to change the community’s future.

It might not seem obvious that People’s Liberty grants are really about the business side of doing good. After all, it’s still philanthropy in the form of a grant, capacity building, and coaching. However, by giving a number of people a small amount of money to try something out, explicitly not requiring more permanence than that, People’s Liberty is incentivizing experimentation. Nobody has to quit a job or start a nonprofit to spend $10,000 in project grants, but it might be the start of something new. And even when the scale is greater, such as in the civic sabbaticals, Avner said the most important piece of advice they give recipients is not to spend too much time at the start trying to figure out whether you’re a business or a nonprofit: step away from that and begin building on your idea.

Read the full article about People's Liberty and urban renewal by Elizabeth Eagen on Medium.