Redeemer Community Partnership

FY23 Program Accomplishments July 1, 2022 to June 30, 2023ADVENTURES AHEADThe goal of Adventures Ahead is to improve education outcomes for elementary students by achieving grade-appropriate literacy and nurturing each childs development as a lifelong reader. Students who remain with the program for a full year average 1.4 years of improvement in their reading proficiency. As COVID-19 has disrupted education across the country, the impact has fallen especially hard on elementary students in low-income Black and Latino communities. Learning loss of 9-10 months has been common. Nevertheless, the students enrolled in the Adventures Ahead program continue to show progress. Adventures Ahead closes the achievement gap for children in South Central LA and nurtures in each one a life-long love for reading.ADVENTURES IN ROBOTICSAdventures in Robotics allows elementary school students the opportunity to engage in authentic engineering and programming experiences using LEGO Education Spike Prime sets. Students learn using online tutorials before branching out to solve more complex problems. Adventures in Robotics is a critical part of our strategy to nurture high academic achievement and a love for learning that bridges children to college and fulfilling careers.SCHOOL CHOICE FAMILY OUTREACHThe neighborhood that Redeemer Community Partnership serves contains some of the lowest performing schools in the state of California. But students also have access to high-performing magnet schools with free transportation, charter schools that are boosting student achievement with innovative strategies, special programs led by local universities and a small number of neighborhood schools that are beating the odds. Over the years we have seen that many families either dont know about the options available or cannot figure out how to access better opportunities. To address this knowledge gap we began publishing a full-color guidebook in Fall 2018, with easily understandable graphics, data charts, maps and instructions for various types of applications. We also posted a bilingual video online. We continue to share our online school choice guide and informational videos. Our community continues to request and utilize these resources. END NEIGHBORHOOD OIL DRILLINGJefferson Oil Drill SiteIn 2013 RCP began organizing residents to close the Jefferson oil drill site in our densely populated community just a few feet from neighboring homes. Over the years, adjacent homes and residents cars were sprayed with oil. Toxic acid fumes killed plants outside the drill site. The deafening din of a workover rig driving 1000s of feet of metal pipe into the ground robbed residents of the peaceful enjoyment of their homes. Closed windows could not keep out petroleum odors and diesel fumes from childrens bedrooms. Residents reported high incidence of miscarriages, pollution-induced headaches, and nighttime nosebleeds in children. When we started the campaign, the drill site was owned by an oil company with a market capitalization of $38 billion. In 2019, following years of organizing, protesting, bringing public officials to tour the site, and participating in public hearings, we won the closure of the drill site. We celebrated this David vs. Goliath victory and quickly got to work on what the site would become.While the oil company capped the oil wells and demolished the oil works, we brought residents together to surface a shared vision for what they wanted to see take its place knowing that if we did not shape the future of the site, the violence of oil extraction would be replaced by the violence of displacement as drive-by developers tear down homes to build student housing. The community wanted to see a community park, affordable housing, and a community center. Next, working with our elected officials, we received a $10 million state grant to purchase the drill site for redevelopment as a community park, affordable housing, and a community center.Murphy Oil Drill SiteNow that the Jefferson Drill Site has been put on a path to closure and clean-up, RCP is working with neighbors to address the last toxic oil drilling site in our community. Efforts to organize residents and monitor the Murphy Drill Site have led to numerous regulatory actions. These include violations for illegally de-gassing massive frac tanks within 1,000 feet of a school, allowing a truck that had been illegal for roadway use to repeatedly transport and deploy radioactive isotopes at the drill site, worker safety violations and more. Moved by this evidence, the City of Los Angeles held a public hearing in April 2022 to review the operators compliance with its operating conditions and the sufficiency of those conditions to protect public health and safety. After ten months of pressure from community residents, including a community teach-in on Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. weekend, the City agreed to end its decades-long practice of disparate and discriminatory treatment of South Central LA residents by extending to our community the same protections given to wealthier, whiter, West LA neighborhoods more than 20-years ago. Predictably, the oil operators have appealed the decision. Meanwhile, our work to protect the health and safety of our children and students continues.OIL PHASE-OUTEvery community impacted by toxic neighborhood drilling does not have a Redeemer Community Partnership to stand in the gap, that is, in the places of vulnerability. Therefore, in 2013 RCP became a founding member of the Stand Together Against Neighborhood Drilling (STAND-LA), a grassroots coalition working to end neighborhood oil drilling and protect the health and safety of residents in vulnerable LA neighborhoods. In January 2022 the City of Los Angeles unanimously approved an ordinance declaring oil extraction a nonconforming land use, beginning a 20-year phase out. At the same time the City approved amortization studies which could shorten the phase-out period considerably. Redeemer Community Partnership works to ensure that phase-out happens in the shortest time possible, that the health and safety of residents and students are protected during the phase-out, and that these drill sites are redeveloped for community benefit. CREATING SAFE ROUTES TO SCHOOLHistoric redlining and dis-investment in South Central LA has left most major boulevards in our community on the Citys High Injury Networkthe 6% of city streets that account for more than 70% of severe injuries and fatalities for people walking. Redeemer Community Partnership surfaces shared vision for safe routes to school and mobility justice for our friends and neighbors who walk, bike and roll by wheelchair.Jefferson BeautifulThis year the City of Los Angeles broke ground on the Jefferson Beautiful project. Redeemer has led a 10-year campaign that secured $12.3 million in grants to realize the communitys vision for safe streets. The project will repair broken sidewalks and add pedestrian lighting, street trees, bike lanes, curb extensions, and new signalized pedestrian crossings to a one-mile stretch of Jefferson Blvd. from Vermont Ave. west to Western Ave. Redeemer Community Partnership continues to engage community members with updates and to monitor construction to ensure the community vision is realized.Normandie BeautifulOver the last four years, RCP led the Normandie Beautiful campaign to create safe routes to school for 9,000 students attending 13 local public schools. The project seeks to transform Normandie Ave., one of Los Angeles High Injury Network streets and a flashpoint in the 1992 Civil Unrest, into a safe and accessible route for people walking, biking and navigating by wheelchair. Redeemer Community Partnership facilitated robust community engagement to surface a shared vision for protecting our most vulnerable roadway users--children and people walking, biking and rolling. Residents envisioned a community where neighbors walk and bike to school and to one anothers homes, instead of driving. Where active streets breathe new life into moribund business corridors. Where active transportation is a safe, viable alternative to modes that burn fossil fuels. Residents envision Normandie Ave. as a beautiful entrance to South Central LA and to home, instead of a high-speed raceway. Neighbors envision a community where not needing to own a car helps keep our community affordable and preserves the diversity that we treasure. The California Transportation Commission awarded the project a highly competitive $27 million grant to make the communitys vision reality. emPOWERWorking in partnership with the Liberty Hill Foundation, Redeemer Community Partnerships emPower program connects low-income residents to energy efficiency rebates and lower utility rates, utility bill cash assistance, free energy-efficient appliances, clean mobility, and more. emPOWER seeks to overcome barriers to clean energy commonly experienced in low-income and working-class communities of