Conference Hosts

Conference Host:
Hispanic Association of Contractors & Enterprises

Founded in 1982, the Hispanic Association of Contractors and Enterprises (HACE) mission is to build safe, stable, economically vital, mixed-income neighborhoods within its primary target area in Eastern North Philadelphia.  HACE combats community deterioration through economic development initiatives that: encourage the growth of businesses and jobs; create safe, affordable housing; and meet the needs of community residents for social services.  Having ended many decades of public and private disinvestment and decline, HACE and its partners now see the neighborhood’s future in positive terms.  HACE has achieved success in both economic development and housing, leveraging over $60 million in development activity.  It has one of the most productive track records of any CDC in the City of Philadelphia.  HACE’s goal is to make the neighborhood a place of choice for a mixed-income, ethnically diverse population and to truly put the neighborhood “on the map” as a center of Latino arts and culture and a city- and region-wide attraction.

Conference Secretariat:
Partners for Livable Communities

Partners for Livable Communities (Partners) is a non-profit leadership organization working to improve the livability of communities by promoting quality of life, economic development and social equity. Since its founding in 1977, Partners has helped communities set a common vision for the future, discover and use new resources for community and economic development, and build public/private coalitions to further their goals.  Partners promotes livable communities through technical assistance, leadership training, workshops, charrettes, research and publications. More than 1,200 individuals and groups from local, state, national, international, public and private and media organizations make up Partners’ resource network and share innovative ideas on livability and community improvement.

In 1984, Partners joined with 11 organizations concerned with Latino opportunity.  Together, these organizations cosponsored “Cities in Transition: Hispanics in the United States” with the City of San Antonio and its mayor, Henry Cisneros, who called the event “a pioneering opportunity to learn and to test new ideas about how cities with diverse populations can provide a climate in which the richness of all groups come forth.”  In 2005, Partners revisited this concept with its “Cities in Transition: Asian-Pacific Islander Americans…An Asset for America’s Future” cosponsored by the Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies and the City of Houston. 

Almost a quarter century after the first Cities in Transition event, Partners and HACE are asking the same question as it relates to heritage development and how to put arts and culture to work for economic development.  Partners and HACE believe a conversation of this magnitude comes at an important time, with over 40 million people