Team Members
- Tiffany L. Young
- Cara Pugh
- Kia L. Davis
Research Project Description
Structural racism in the US has created communities that are racially and economically segregated. These historically oppressed communities are subjected to health-damaging shortages of employment opportunities, affordable housing, green space, and grocery stores. Community benefits agreements (CBAs) are legally binding contracts for economic justice between developers and communities. They encourage economic development, typically establishing provisions related to employment, living wages, affordable housing, green space, and other factors that can improve health. Moreover, CBAs are usually implemented in historically oppressed communities and thus could mitigate the impact of structural racism on communities. Yet, there are no comprehensive evaluations of CBA impact on socioeconomic position (SEP) or health. The majority of the literature examining CBAs has focused on the important but limited scope of formation and inclusivity of local organizing coalitions or the legal aspects of the agreements, overlooking community-level changes in SEP and health. Thus, our primary research question is to understand how CBAs alleviate the multigenerational impact of structural racism on the socioeconomic and health trajectories of historically oppressed communities.
We propose a 3-part approach to answer this question where we will:
- Quantify changes in community SEP and health after CBA implementation in cities across the nation;
- Define multigenerational racialized stress and the psychological impact of living in segregated neighborhoods through a community-centered lens;
- Build upon Parts 1 & 2 to evaluate changes in stress and other outcomes for the St. Louis Power Building Academy, a program designed to enhance community advocacy and deepen understanding of systems to implement future CBAs.
Our goal is to inform the implementation and evaluation of CBAs across the St. Louis region and create an adaptable evidence-based toolkit that can be used nationwide.
Team Members
Tiffany L. Young
Tiffany L. Young, Ph.D., is the CEO of Lenell and Lillie Consulting, a firm that provides research and evaluation consulting services to an array of organizations. Our ultimate mission is to provide organizations with expertise and tools to shape and enhance their tomorrow. By training, Tiffany is a gerontologist and qualitative methodologist who is dedicated to addressing health inequities across the life span through evidence-based strategies and multigenerational community engagement.
Cara Pugh
Cara Pugh received a Bachelor's degree in Public Policy, a double minor in Education and African American & Diaspora Studies from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill; paired with a Masters in Education, from the University of Missouri, St. Louis. Cara supports residents, students, educators, and parents in building and holding power through policy and systems level change for educational equity and economic justice.
Kia L. Davis
Kia Davis is an Assistant Professor in the Division of Public Health Sciences at Washington University School of Medicine. She is a social epidemiologist whose goal is to lead action-oriented, policy-relevant research focused on understanding the impact of structural racism on health to inform social change. She has 16+ years of experience leading cross-sector and interdisciplinary research in government and academic settings with the goal of reducing health disparities in communities of color.
