With an inaugural grant from the Heinz Endowments in late 2014, we created the Neighborhood Allies Community Development Fellowship Program to attract and connect emerging and potential leaders to local community development opportunities and create a mentoring program that pairs community development staff with senior-level professionals in the field.
The Neighborhood Allies Fellowship Program is designed to foster the attraction, acquisition and retention of minority leadership in the Community Development sector of greater Pittsburgh. Our recruitment efforts are focused on minorities and those who live in underserved communities. The fellows will expand Neighborhood Allies’ current expertise, capacity, and credibility to provide additional services, resources, and connections to Pittsburgh’s communities of need. We will host three fellows simultaneously for one-year placements at Neighborhood Allies and/or community-based 
organizations in underserved communities at competitive salaries. After each fellow’s year is over, they will have valuable skills and connections within the community development field.
Doni Crawford is our inaugural Fellow and she is focused on community data and policy. She is responsible for assisting community-based organizations with the identification of data sources, priorities for analysis, and the data collection planning process. Doni also works with community leaders to inform the selection of relevant indications of community health and helps communicate neighborhood data and research to draw policy and investment related conclusions. During her time with us, Doni will also advocate for the need and use of data-driven interventions by community-based organizations to solve problems that have largely resulted from generations of disinvestment and stagnated potential.
“My time as a Community Data and Policy fellow at Neighborhood Allies has truly been invaluable. I had little community development experience upon entering my fellowship and to be honest, I was apprehensive about the title “fellow.” I was at a stage in my career where I didn’t want to just be doing intern level work. To my immense surprise, this fellowship has been everything but that! Here’s a quick snapshot: I have developed and distributed a data needs assessment to over 200 local and regional community organizations, traveled to Denver, Colorado to learn more about community data at a meeting of the National Neighborhood Indicators Partnership (NNIP), written a grant proposal in collaboration with the Allegheny County Health Department, Allegheny General Hospital and the Buhl Foundation, engaged in high-level talks with the Mayor’s Office, written a memorandum to the Director of City Planning on strategic community investment and composed grant evaluation reports for our past catalytic grant recipients. All that and my fellowship hasn’t even reached its halfway point! I can honestly say that community development now has a place in my heart and I can’t wait to see what Neighborhood Allies has in store for me next!”
