Ayize James is Research in Action’s Research Support Specialist. In Research in Action’s work on the Nexus Open Road Fund, Ayize played a central role in co-creating the definition of Black wealth. Learn more about Ayize in this Staf Spotlight.

Dr. Brittany Lewis, CEO and founder of Research in Action and a senior research associate at the Center for Urban and Regional Affairs, helped the task force gather the relevant data and information to guide the creation of an Office for Missing and Murdered Black Women. Read more.

Disturbed by this data, Twin Cities Habitat for Humanity got to work with Research in Action, a nonprofit research education organization. CEO Brittany Lewis’ first suggestion for Habitat was to “build a new table.”

Emma Wu is Research in Action’s Special Projects Manager. In 2022, Emma was RIA’s project lead on the Artists & Justice Research Project, produced for the McKnight Foundation. Learn more about Emma in this Staff Spotlight.

The Twin Cities is known to have one of the biggest disparities in homeownership in the country between Black and white Americans. There are many systemic reasons for this gap, one of which can be traced back to a practice that developed at the turn of the 20th century. WCCO looked into how racially restrictive covenants have, over the years, shaped the Twin Cities area.

Minnesota has become the first state in the country to establish a task force on missing and murdered African American women. Advocates say the initiative is long overdue. Gov. Tim Walz made it official in a ceremonial bill signing earlier this week. The 12-member panel includes representatives from the courts, law enforcement and victim advocacy groups.

George Floyd’s killing last year sparked a renewed push to reform Minnesota’s criminal justice system.

Joi Lewis and Brittany Lewis are leading an effort called “Time of Reckoning,” a series of community engagement sessions that will culminate in a policy roundtable in June on criminal justice reform.

The effort, backed by a group of Minnesota Black community leaders, aims to center Black voices and conduct the sessions in a way that’s also healing.

If you looked at a map of Minneapolis unfolding over time, you’d see waves of demographic changes sweeping across the city. You’d see large sections of the city that are affordable to lower income folks shrink and then disappear. Zooming in on North Minneapolis, you’d see neighborhoods of Jewish immigrants moving in and then out, followed by Black families. You’d see evictions and foreclosures spike during the 2008 recession, but in only a few spots. You might wonder: why?

On June 3, Call to Mind, Minnesota Public Radio’s mental health initiative, presented a live virtual community conversation to address the need for healing and action in the aftermath of George Floyd’s death. Hosted by MPR News’ Angela Davis, the conversation covered the history of racial injustice that led to Floyd’s murder and how trauma and policing affects Black Americans.

The report, “The Illusion of Choice,” whose chief investigator was Brittany Lewis, senior research associate at CURA, highlights the experiences of women and men who have struggled to find stable housing in the area. One detail that jumps out: Many of the tenants surveyed were so desperate to find a place to live that they had little choice in their apartment. And when the survey participants were evicted from their homes, often for falling behind on rent, over half experienced homelessness.

Cities across the country are booming, but their growth is exacerbating an already critical lack of affordable housing for the middle class and poor alike. The solutions being proposed in many cities run the gamut from rent control to federal subsidies, but Minneapolis has landed on something even bolder that strikes at the heart of how cities have grown and defined themselves over the past century. Single-family-only neighborhoods, a staple of city and suburban planning, are woven into the DNA of the American dream: the leafy, peaceful street lined with stand-alone houses, green lawns and plenty of elbow room.

Neighborhoods across the Twin Cities are changing, but some say that’s not always a good thing. Longtime residents of now “up and coming” areas could be getting forced out. That was one finding of a University of Minnesota research project put on by the Center for Regional and Urban Affairs (CURA).