How State and Local Governments Can Strengthen Economic Development and Advance Economic Mobility
By New Growth Innovation Network
State and local governments strengthen economic development and advance economic mobility by building the partnerships needed to ensure every program reaches the people it was designed to serve. The evidence from NGIN's Economic Partnership Alliance, which worked with coalitions in 24 cities, points to a consistent pattern: achieving lasting economic progress, especially in communities facing persistent distress, demands collaboration, not just good programs. It requires durable cross-sector partnerships built on shared decision-making, mutual accountability, and the agility to adapt as conditions change. This guide lays out what that means in practice, with examples from cities that have done it.
What Economic Mobility Asks of Government
Economic mobility combines economic success, power and autonomy, and dignity and belonging in one's community. That broader definition matters for governments because it locates mobility where it is actually produced: in neighborhoods, through housing, small businesses, jobs, and civic voice, and mostly through organizations that government does not run.
A state agency or city hall can appropriate funds, set rules, convene partners, and hold the pen on plans. What it cannot do alone is earn the trust of a neighborhood that has watched past plans gather dust, or deliver technical assistance to a resident-owned business at the pace that business needs. That work belongs to community-based organizations and economic development organizations. The government's leverage lies in how well it partners with them.
Why Choosing a Program Shouldn't Be the First Step
It may seem like finding the right program to adopt is the natural first step and there are plenty of evidence-based programs and resources available to help leaders identify approaches that have worked elsewhere. However, the same workforce initiative can transform one neighborhood and stall in the next—and the difference is rarely the program design. What actually determines whether a program works is whether the organizations on the ground were partners in shaping it, resourced to run it, and trusted by the residents it was meant to serve.
Building the right leadership team and centering residents' lived experience comes before choosing an economic mobility strategy. The six practices below are the government-specific version of that advice.
Six Practices for State and Local Governments
Each practice below is drawn from the Alliance Playbook's case studies, which document nine of the Alliance's 24 coalitions and how they brought community-based organizations, economic development organizations, and often local government to the same table. The cities are linked where they appear, and each case study includes its own do's and don'ts for replicating the approach.
Fund the partnership, not just the program. In Sarasota, the city's Office of Economic Development and the Amaryllis Park Neighborhood Association rebuilt a working relationship in a neighborhood with a long history of broken promises. The lesson their coalition drew was blunt: without stipends, technical assistance, and organizational grants, residents and community-based organizations cannot sustain engagement at the level needed to influence city processes. For states, this means writing facilitation and partner capacity into grant terms rather than treating them as overhead.
Share decision-making power on purpose. Sarasota's partners found that both sides had to unlearn default habits where decision-making authority concentrated on the city side. Power sharing happens through explicit decision-making protocols and documented roles. The Playbook's Power-Sharing Charter Template exists for exactly this reason: a written agreement that spells out who decides what, whose voice carries weight, how resources flow, and how partners hold one another accountable.
Let community-based organizations lead where trust is thin. In Cleveland, the partnership between MetroHealth and Metro West Community Development Organization regained credibility when Metro West stepped back into a visible leadership role and the anchor institution supported that leadership rather than overshadowing it. Government can play the same anchor role: reinforcement and resources behind community leadership, not in front of it.
Match institutional timelines to community pace. The city operates on regulatory timelines, while nonprofits and business groups focus on more immediate community needs. That is how Sacramento's coalition described its central tension—and it is universal. Sarasota turned the mismatch into an asset: when the city needed extra time to review zoning and permitting, the neighborhood association used the interval to hold resident listening sessions, and when the association lacked capacity for formal documentation, city staff drafted the meeting notes.
Show up consistently, and put commitments in writing. Cleveland's Clark-Fulton Master Plan named five core partners, including the City of Cleveland, and lost momentum when convening stopped and partners pursued their own pieces. In Honolulu, institutional partners withdrew midway, and the coalition's advice afterward was to get written, binding commitments from large institutional partners. Government's reliability is itself an intervention.
Measure mobility, not outputs. Six months into Sarasota's work there was still no construction to point to, but something else had changed. For the first time in years, city officials and neighborhood leaders were presenting at public meetings together and using the same language, and residents stayed two hours and gave them a standing ovation. That is progress worth measuring. Programs launched and dollars spent are inputs. The outcome is whether residents gain income, ownership, and a real voice in what happens next.
What It Looks Like in Practice
Sarasota and Sacramento are two of nine case studies documented in the Alliance Playbook, each with its own do's and don'ts for replicating the approach. Sacramento's shows what the six practices look like when they run together.
Sacramento's Office of Economic Development joined the Mutual Assistance Network, the Greater Sacramento Urban League, the Del Paso Boulevard Partnership, and CLTRE with an unusual premise: the partnership itself was the project. The city brought institutional coordination and planning expertise; the community organizations brought neighborhood trust and business relationships. By the end of the program, the city was folding the partnership's insights into its own planning, and community organizations were using city connections to advance outcomes.
FAQ for State and Local Leaders
Which initiatives have successfully strengthened economic development and advanced economic mobility? The NGIN's Partnership Playbook documents nine case studies, including Sarasota, Sacramento, Detroit, and Cleveland, each with city or regional economic development partners at the table. Their common thread is supporting cross-sector, durable partnerships with structure, facilitation, and trust rather than one single program model.
What economic mobility programs should our state consider adopting? Start with the partnership infrastructure, then choose programs your local coalitions can actually deliver. A program adopted without the organizations to run it, and the trust to reach residents, produces a plan rather than an impactful result.
What can state governments do to improve economic mobility? The case studies in NGIN's Partnership Playbook point to six practices: fund partnership capacity alongside programs, share decision-making with community organizations, let those organizations lead where trust is thin, match institutional timelines to community pace, put commitments in writing, and measure resident outcomes rather than program outputs. Each is drawn from a documented coalition, with the details in the sections above.
Economic mobility is built locally, and government's most powerful role is making durable local partnership possible. See how nine cities did it in the Alliance Playbook's case studies, and explore Core Insights for the four building blocks that made their coalitions last
