DESCRIPTION OF ISSUE
WHERE/WHEN APPLICABLE

DESCRIPTION OF ISSUE:
The City of Boston has long recognized the importance of devoting special attention to economically underdeveloped sections of the city, especially in terms of creating jobs, job training, and fostering new businesses. 

Since 1994, based on several measures of poverty and urban blight, the City has set apart certain sections of Boston for special economic development efforts. Originally known as an "Enhanced Enterprise Community," today the underdeveloped areas are called "Empowerment Zones." The Empowerment Zone is a 5.8-mile area of contiguous census tracts that includes parts of the Heart of the City in Jamaica Plain and Roxbury.

Between 1999 and 2009, the City of Boston is to receive approximately $10 million annually in federal aid to be spent on job creation, education, training, and development programs within this Enterprise Zone.

According to the Roxbury Strategic Master Plan published in 2004, there are at least three key services that the federal Empowerment Zone Program can provide to Roxbury to enhance the quality of economic development and job training: emphasize the distribution of information that informs small businesses how capital can be accessed, provide information throughout the neighborhood about available jobs at various sites, and work closely with community-based organizations to enhance the quality of job training for the apprenticeable trades.

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WHERE/ WHEN APPLICABLE:
The Grove Hall and Egleston Square areas of the Heart of the City are two focus areas in the Empowerment Zone. A map of Boston's Empowerment Zone area is available here. Boston Connects, Inc. offers companies tax benefits for locating in these areas and for hiring people who live there.

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