Neighborworks America is celebrating its 45th Anniversary this week! Its story begins with Dorothy Mae Richardson, an African American activist and Pittsburgh resident who organized community members around access to safe, affordable housing in the 1960s. To help improve renters' lives and homeownership rates, Richardson and her neighbors in the North Side founded Citizens Against Slum Housing and challenged institutions to invest in communities. These organizing efforts served as the groundwork for the creation of Neighborhood Housing Services in Pittsburgh. Soon after, in 1978, Congress established the Neighborhood Reinvestment Corporation, known today as Neighborworks America.

Picture of Dorothy Mae Richardson