Infrastructure knits a region and a city together; it binds the framework of a neighborhood. On the broad level, we think of transportation, utilities, and broadband as our infrastructure. However, schools and parks, housing of all types, health and recreation facilities, retail stores, art centers, and religious institutions are also infrastructure that defines and describes each neighborhood. That infrastructure supports residents, leads visitors in and out of the community, and defines its culture. Many of those vital community services are provided by nonprofit organizations, and this country would not be what it is today without this important sector. The nonprofit sector is particularly vital in low-income and low-wealth communities, where it fills important gaps in service and infrastructure.

Government, the for-profit sector, and the nonprofit sector share  responsibility for owning and managing components of every community’s infrastructure. Nonprofit corporations may be background partners, working as part of the fabric of the community to provide a youth center, a music school, or a tutoring program, for instance. In economically distressed communities, the nonprofit sector is commonly the focal point of activity, the gathering point, the economic center that provides food and shelter, temporary or permanent housing, child care for working parents, and primary healthcare for the uninsured. It is quite often the community’s largest employer, working to link the community to other components to unify a neighborhood.
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Many nonprofit corporations are key partners with governments in helping populations with special needs, designing and delivering services like child welfare, supportive housing, and counseling for the mentally ill. Other nonprofit entities work for clean water and air, leading to the adoption of new government policies. When a national emergency occurs, such as the subprime mortgage crisis the United States is confronting today, the government turns to nonprofit corporations for help. Hundreds of nonprofit housing support centers across the country have mobilized to develop ways to keep families in their homes or to avoid bankruptcy and save them from complete financial loss so they can move on and find affordable rental housing.

Linking this diverse group of entities together is a commonly held belief in the need for an independent corporate model that does not benefit shareholders, whose “profit” is community benefit first and every other consideration second, and that can offer a tax deduction to a donor as a way of stimulating charitable contributions. Because its success is tied to the tax code, the nonprofit sector has a close legal and philosophical relationship with the federal government.

This is an excerpt from The NEXT American Opportunity. The full text can be downloaded as an Adobe PDF Document.