Community Development

During the century after Emancipation, Third Ward by necessity blossomed as a vibrant retail and business community fueled by Black entrepreneurs and business-owners locked out of other parts of the city by the legal segregation of the Jim Crow era.

In the 70s and 80s, although legal segregation had ended, economic isolation and years of disinvestment and neglect gutted the Third Ward economy. Project Row Houses was founded just as the community was organizing to reverse this trend.

Emancipation Community Development Partnership

Community development takes intentional work by a mix of partners. In 2016, PRH was part of forming the Emancipation Community Development Partnership (ECDP), with the participation of many Third Ward leaders and organizations and support from the Houston Endowment and Kinder Foundation.

The ECDP developed and evaluated an initial set of community-based performance indicators and initiatives in public education and public health selected to help partners learn how to prevent the displacement of long-term residents and support neighborhood revitalization efforts.

The work identified four areas:
1. Affordable Housing Stabilization and Development
2. Equitable Community Economic Development
3. Arts-Based Community Development and Cultural Preservation
4. Community-Based Public Policy Development

Emancipation Economic Development Council

While PRH was already a significant contributor to work in these areas, the ECDP’s research made it clear that Third Ward needed a more organized and strategic push particularly around points 2 and 4, equitable community economic development and community-based public policy development.

A group of churches, nonprofits, community development corporations, business owners, artists, and residents that were working together as part of the ECDP—many of which had long histories of working together—coalesced into the Emancipation Economic Development Council.

Some critical early work of the EEDC includes:

• Obtaining Texas Main Street Program designation from the Texas Historical Commission that provides support for economic development of historic downtown areas for a stretch of Emancipation Avenue.
• Established the Third Ward Is Home Civic Club, Houston’s first civic club composed primarily of renters, focused on tenants’ rights initiatives.
• Co-programming with PRH’s Financial Opportunity Center to assist Third Ward residents with financial coaching, social services, and workforce training.
• Garnered support from anchor institutions – Texas Southern University, the University of Houston, Hermann Memorial Hospital, and Houston First – to increase employment opportunities for Third Ward residents. 

Learn More About EEDC