About Lawrence CommunityWorks
Lawrence CommunityWorks is committed to transforming Lawrence through comprehensive, resident-led strategies. From housing and economic opportunity to education and civic empowerment, LCW’s integrated approach builds equity and sustainable change from within the community.
Mission & Vision
We envision neighborhoods where every resident has the opportunity, skills, and resources to shape their future and contribute to the success of their community. Through affordable housing, economic opportunity, thriving local businesses, and welcoming public spaces, we work to create places where individuals and families can grow, connect, and prosper.
At the heart of this vision is resident leadership. We believe lasting change happens when people come together to build relationships, strengthen community voice, and take an active role in shaping the future of their neighborhoods. By investing in people, place, and systems, we help create stronger communities where everyone has a stake in creating positive, lasting change.
Our
Approach
A Community Network Powered by People
LCW pursues its mission through a three-pronged approach focused on people, places, and systems. Our strategic plan and coordinated programs are designed to help residents become strong and financially resilient; to promote stable, environmentally healthy places with a high quality of life; and to encourage the systems and institutions around our community to work collaboratively and effectively in support of resident needs.
People
Programs that help residents build skills, savings, and financial resilience — the foundation for everything else.
Places
Stable, environmentally healthy neighborhoods with a real quality of life: housing residents can afford, open space, and a working local economy.
Systems
Public and private institutions that coordinate with each other and respond to what residents actually need.
Founding Members of Immigrant City Community Housing Corporation
1981-1986
Our Roots:
A fight over one blighted lot
A group of local affordable-housing activists, organized since 1981 as Immigrant City Community Housing Corporation, set out to build 140 units of affordable housing on a North Common tract left vacant by a failed urban-renewal plan. When the city's redevelopment process didn't guarantee enough affordable housing, the group organized around displaced residents' rights, forced a new selection process, and won the right to develop the site themselves — just as the real estate market collapsed. Under board president Leonard F. Raymond, the group broadened its mission beyond housing and incorporated as Heritage Common Community Development Corporation: the CDC that became LCW. We owe special thanks to founders Len Raymond, Armand Hyatt, Isabel Melendez, Pat Smith, Father Bob Guessetto, Modesto Maldonado, Ana Colon, Rev. Jim Keller, Jacques Fournier, Charles Crowley, and Angela Harty.
Early Years
Growth & reinvention
Beyond one neighborhood
To avoid confusion with the new housing development, the organization changed its name to Lawrence Planning & Neighborhood Development Corporation. The board expanded its territory west and north of North Common and took on two more affordable housing properties LCW still owns and manages today: Berkeley Place Apartments, a 38-unit complex, and Bradford Apartments, a 5-unit wood-frame building. During these years, LPNDC also ran an arson-prevention program in response to the wave of fires then threatening Lawrence, working with the city's Fire Department on a youth initiative known as the "Junior Firefighters" — the organization's first real foray into youth-focused community work.
1998 - 1999
People behind the Berkeley Place project include (from left) consultant Daniel Bumagin, building management chief Ken Stoll, Heritage Common vice president Mel Barbogallo and staffer Ana Levy.
Rebirth
Down to one staffer, then rebuilt from a storefront
By 1998, the organization had lost its city and state funding and was down to a core board and a single staff member, property manager Ana Levy. That year, Lawrence native and community development professional Bill Traynor began organizing in North Common with three MIT graduate students — Kristen Harol, Tamar Kotelchuck, and Jessica Andors — through an initiative called Reviviendo, "re-birth," which engaged residents in neighborhood planning and launched a new youth program. The board asked Bill to rebuild the organization. On July 12, 1999, he and the team — joined by affordable-housing expert Debra Fox and, soon after, organizer Alma Couverthié — moved into a storefront at 197 Essex St. and began the turnaround that became Lawrence CommunityWorks.
LCW Today
Four decades of organizing, measured in a neighborhood rebuilt.
5,000+
resident members
354
affordable homes built
$164M+
in new neighborhood investment
24
once-vacant parcels reclaimed
That investment also built a community center and three new playgrounds, and now supports family asset-building and youth development programs reaching thousands of residents — making LCW one of the most active forces for equitable development in Massachusetts.