The Aspen Institute Latinos & Society Program (AILAS) has announced that it received grants totaling nearly $1.7 million from partners dedicated to advancing prosperity for underserved business and entrepreneurial communities. 

Specifically earmarked for the Aspen City Action Lab, which works to unite Latino small businesses with local entrepreneurial and civic leaders to spur economic growth and share ways to expand business opportunities, the grants include $600,000 from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, $500,000 from Google.org, $375,000 from the Coca-Cola Company, and $100,000 each from the Hispanic Scholarship Fund and the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. The award from the Kauffman Foundation will bolster efforts to systematize the Aspen City Action Lab program’s design so that it can benefit future cohorts of participating cities. The grant from Google will boost the lab’s action-oriented strategies to prepare for a digitized world. The Coca-Cola Company and the Hispanic Scholarship Fund grants were awarded in overall support of the Aspen City Action Lab initiative. 

The Aspen City Action Lab was launched as a pilot program in 2021 with communities in Chicago; El Paso, Texas; Miami; Phoenix; San Antonio, Texas; and San Bernardino, California. The initiative is aiding Latino-majority cities to generate long-term, inclusive economic growth through data-driven, community-informed approaches. Having built partnerships with more than 70 cross-sector leaders in the pilot cities, City Action Lab is also building nationwide networks so more cities can be added when the pilot phase concludes.

“Latinos are launching companies at a faster rate than other groups and accounted for 52 percent of net job growth in the past decade. This success occurred despite many having little formal business education, nor access to capital and supportive networks enjoyed by other demographics,” said AILAS executive director Domenika Lynch. “The support of the Kauffman Foundation, Google.org, the Coca-Cola Company, the Hispanic Scholarship Fund, and the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce will make a real difference in helping the City Action Lab unleash the full dynamism of this underserved sector of our nation. The resulting growth will help boost our entire economy.”

(Photo credit: Getty Images/gorodenkoff)