Hartford Areas Rally Together (HART)

HART's mission is to empower resident's and organizations of Hartford to effectively address neighborhood issues. ________ Hartford Areas Rally Together (HART), the oldest existing community organizing group in New England, works with residents to create change, improvements and opportunities in HART’s neighborhoods and city-wide. HART engages in grassroots, multi-issue and multi-neighborhood organizing. As a result, issue campaigns and problem-solving work can range from issues such as parking problems and litter to police-community relations and immigrant and refugee rights. Through participation in our problem solving campaigns, HART also seeks to empower Hartford residents with the leadership skills necessary to be proactive within their communities.

________ HART’s HOME Program seeks to improve conditions in Hartford in a very concrete and substantive way that produces multiple outcomes: through increased home ownership. By providing a comprehensive and thorough first time home buyer education, HART not only prepares low and moderate income people to overcome the barriers to home purchase, but prepares them for successful and long term homeownership. By thoroughly preparing people for successful home ownership, HART’s HOME Program assists in increasing the home ownership rate in Hartford, which in turn builds wealth for families, stabilizes neighborhoods and generates sorely needed revenues for Hartford’s municipal government. HART’s HOME Program includes many of the “best practices” of effective Home Owner Education programs as outlined in “What Works in Programs Offering Counseling and Training to Low-Income Homebuyers,” a report by the Enterprise Foundation, is HUD approved, offered in Spanish and English and serves over 300 people annually with only 2 program staff. The HOME program serves more people than similar area programs that have double the staff of HART! ________ Together, HART’s programs improve conditions for residents of Hartford through the resolution of specific community problems, by building power among residents and by boosting the wealth of Hartford families (and, thereby, the municipal government) through increased opportunities for successful home ownership.