About Us


Burlington
Associates in Community Development,
LLC is a national consulting cooperative established in 1993.
The firm’s seven partners and two associates have assisted nonprofit
organizations, municipal governments, and state agencies in nineteen
different states. The cooperative’s seven partners and three associates
operate out of offices in Burlington, VT, Boston, MA, St. Joseph, MN,
Portland, OR, Cambridge, NY, and Oakland, CA. 


Approximately a
third of the firm's time is devoted to organizational development,
with an emphasis on nonprofit start-ups, multi-partner mergers and
collaborations, and strategic planning. A third is devoted to
physical development, with an emphasis on creating permanently
affordable housing and developing a variety of community facilities for
nonprofit organizations. A third is devoted to planning,
evaluation, and program design for public-sector and
third-sector organizations engaged in community development.


In addition to
working directly for nonprofit community development organizations,
municipal governments, and state agencies, Burlington Associates has had
an on-going relationship with three national intermediaries: the Institute
for Community Economics (ICE); the Neighborhood
Reinvestment Corporation (NRC); and the National Community
Capital Association (NCCA).


Burlington
Associates
is guided in its selection of clients, its definition of problems, and
its assessment of alternative courses of action by six principles. These
principles represent a practical philosophy of community development.
Equitable and sustainable community development, according to this
philosophy, is made possible by:




  • Encouraging economic
    self-sufficiency through local ownership and maximum use of local
    resources;


  • Equalizing the
    benefits and burdens of growth;


  • Leveraging and
    recycling scarce public funds;


  • Protecting and
    preserving fragile environmental resources;


  • Ensuring full
    participation by populations normally excluded from the political and
    economic mainstream; and


  • Nurturing a robust
    "third sector" of private, nonprofit organizations capable of working
    in concert with government to deliver essential goods and services.


 


Burlington Associates
in Community Development, LLC

PO Box 994

Burlington, Vermont 05402