In 2004, PPL directly served nearly 7,000 people through our interconnected programs.
PPL’s mission is to assist lower-income individuals and families to work toward self-sufficiency by providing housing, jobs and training. We create opportunities for growth through several integrated programs:
- Affordable Housing –Rental and Ownership
- Jobs and Employment Readiness Training
- Personal & Community Support Services
- Youth Development
Address: 1035 E. Franklin Avenue, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55404-2920
Phone: (612) 455-5100 FAX: 455-510
website
Founded in 1972, PPL is a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping lower-income families develop the tools they need to achieve self-sufficiency. PPL ‘s earliest activities were devoted to increasing the supply of affordable, quality housing as a stabilizing force in the inner city neighborhoods of Minneapolis.
Today, PPL recognizes and responds to the multiple challenges faced by our community as low-income people strive for self-sufficiency. During the past 32 years, PPL has grown to be one of the most trusted affordable-housing, employment, job-training and human-service organizations in the Twin Cities. Our entrepreneurial approach gets things done, frugally and efficiently. Careful growth has enabled PPL to become a strong, stable organization with the capacity to address current concerns and trends in our communities. PPL creates opportunities for low-income families through comprehensive, integrated programs. PPL’s programs directly served more than 6,800 men, women and children in 2003 —an all-time record for the organization—and our affordable rental-housing portfolio increased to 660 units.
Every day at PPL, people’s lives are changed for the better; they are empowered and encouraged to hope for a brighter, stable future.
- Dedicated to creating and maintaining affordable housing for rental and ownership, PPL has completed more than 1300 affordable housing units located in Minneapolis and St. Paul neighborhoods and inner-ring suburbs.
- Through our job programs and businesses, thousands of adults have advanced their skills to become contributing members of the community, among them, immigrants, men and women leaving prison, and others who are economically disadvantaged. Many have received training and gone on to work for employers such as Abbott Northwestern Hospital and US Bank.
- PPL’s Self-Sufficiency Program provides support to families, typically single parents, designed to help them gain greater self-reliance and leave dependence on public assistance behind. Education programs provide children and youth with quality learning environment and relationships with caring adults tutor/mentors.
Guiding the organization’s growth and current programs is the motto: “Give me a fish and I eat for a day; teach me to fish and I eat for a lifetime”. This expresses our commitment to the values of a strong work ethic, personal accountability and responsibility, and the participation of the disenfranchised in their own growth toward self-sufficiency. These values reinforce our mission, which is to assist lower income individuals and families to work toward self-sufficiency by providing housing, jobs and training.
PPL works cooperatively and creatively with community and neighborhood groups, businesses, civic organizations, government agencies, other non-profits, colleges and universities. Our work is based on a set of reciprocal expectations: That the families and individuals we serve to work toward a productive lifestyle and that those who have “made it” help others reach their goals. In this way, PPL exists as a critical bridge between those who can help and those who benefit from support. The organization is well managed and fiscally strong through the efforts of thousands, by way of gifts, grants, volunteer time and in-kind donations.
Geographic area served: PPL serves low-income families of Minneapolis and St. Paul, concentrating on the communities of Phillips, Central and Near North in Minneapolis, and Thomas-Dale (Selby) and Summit-University in St. Paul. PPL has increased involvement in the suburban communities of St. Louis Park, New Hope and Richfield.
Population served: PPL’s participants are individuals and families whose incomes are low and who live in distressed neighborhoods. They are generally in need of jobs, housing and/or support services. A majority receives public assistance. A demographic sampling of PPL participants follows:
| Women |
58% |
| Men |
42% |
| African American |
64% |
| Somali/African |
13% |
| Caucasian |
8% |
| American Indian |
8% |
| Asian American |
3% |
| Chicano/Latino |
4% |
We will see more changes in the next 25 years than we have experienced over the past 100. To thrive in the midst of this global change, the American Indian community must be unified and agile, work in partnership, eliminate deficit-driven methods, and invest in comprehensive asset-based strategies.
