Chris Coleman for Saint Paul

Saint Paul’s strength lies its strong, historic neighborhoods. However, decades of disinvestment and a national foreclosure crisis have kept some of our neighborhoods from prospering. Mayor Coleman has taken steps to close that gap, by developing an innovative approach to attract new investment in our neighborhoods and build a strong middle class. Through investing wisely and leveraging public and private resources, Chris Coleman’s groundbreaking “Invest Saint Paul” initiative is addressing the most critical needs in our communities, from housing to healthcare. As a result, Invest Saint Paul has made Saint Paul a national model for neighborhood investment and foreclosure prevention. As a result, Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government and Governing magazine have named Mayor Coleman one of America’s “Innovative Leaders.”

A National Leader in Combating Foreclosures

Mayor Coleman has marshaled City resources to identify homeowners at risk of foreclosure and help families stay in their homes. Under Chris Coleman’s leadership, City departments from Public Works to libraries have pooled their efforts to counsel more than 3,000 families and prevent more than 1,500 foreclosures. In addition, Mayor Coleman has built a coalition of cities from across the country that are using innovative legal strategies to combat absentee landlords and hold reckless lending institutions accountable for their actions. And in 2008 alone, Saint Paul’s vacant-building initiative — recently featured in The New York Times — safely rehabbed more than 900 buildings, allowing them to be reoccupied. Chris Coleman has targeted City resources to stabilize neighborhoods that have suffered from disinvestment because he knows that for our city to thrive, all neighborhoods must thrive.

Expanding Economic Opportunity — One Block at a Time

Mayor Coleman’s investment strategy is revitalizing Saint Paul by creating economic opportunity in every neighborhood. Central Corridor light rail is creating $1 billion in investment in the Summit–University, Frogtown and Hamline–Midway neighborhoods. The Payne–Phalen neighborhood is seeing new jobs and enterprise, including a new shopping center that features the most environmentally friendly Cub Foods in the nation. These successes — along with multi-use, LEED-certified Winnipeg development on Rice Street and new opportunities for shopping, banking and healthcare along West Seventh Street, among other examples — demonstrate that when City leaders step up to marshal strategic investment, every neighborhood can prosper.

Bringing People Together to Provide Expanded Dental Care to Children

Dental decay is the most prevalent chronic childhood illness affecting children. To combat this problem, in 2007 Chris Coleman launched the Invest Saint Paul Dental Initiative in partnership with the Smiles Across Minnesota coalition to provide children access to preventive dental services. Today, Children’s Dental Services eliminates barriers to dental care for low-income families by bringing care directly to children in permanent clinics in six elementary schools in Saint Paul, as well as in libraries and community centers. In the first year of the initiative, more than 3,100 Saint Paul children received needed dental care during the course of over 4,500 visits. The Dental Initiative will eventually serve children in need in all 44 public elementary schools in Saint Paul.