Past Projects

From 1986 through 1998 G&A services were almost exclusively facilitating the development of large-scale state and federal grants for a very wide range of clients. Over this period, G&A grants were funded over 90% of the time resulting in over $430 million in funding. Below the summaries of major projects (below) are links to summaries for other G&A projects conducted between 1986 and 2000.

San Francisco Drug Court: Research and design San Francisco’s Drug Court. G&A facilitated a two-year research and planning process involving multiple public and private agencies across public health, criminal justice and housing fields to develop one of the largest and most successful drug courts in the country. As part of this work, G&A conducted extensive research on the few communities in which drug courts existed to help San Francisco ‘envision’ what such a could look like. Ongoing meetings were conducted with leaders from systems that were historically adversarial in nature (district attorney and public defender) or who had rarely worked together (public health and criminal justice). The outgrowth of these meetings was a shared understanding of the benefits both to their systems and to their clients of working in a treatment focused system instead of one driven by evidence and incarceration. This remains the single most gratifying project G&A has ever completed.

Interactive University & the Berkeley Pledge: In partnership with the University of California at Berkeley, the cities of Oakland and San Francisco, the San Francisco and Oakland Unified School Districts, and local corporations, G&A developed an innovative technology grant, The Interactive University, linking the University with community institutions in West Oakland and Bayview Hunters Point, and with those communities’ school districts. The project developed curriculum and online courses linking students in San Francisco and Oakland with experts from UC Berkeley. With almost a thousand applications, the Interactive University received one of only twenty grants. The Interactive University is a key component of the Berkeley Pledge which is a ‘pipeline’ designed to encourage more students of color from throughout the Bay Area to attend the University.

Healthy Start Infant Mortality Initiative: In partnership with Research Development Associates, research and design of an Afro-Centric, social model Healthy Start initiative designed to reduce infant mortality in Oakland. The process involved convening a large number of neighborhood level focus groups to engage the target population first by obtaining their input and then in engaging them in one of several task forces. The resulting model departed significantly from other models funded by the federal government. Oakland Healthy Start achieved the highest outcomes in the country and became a national model for infant mortality reduction.

Modesto City Schools-Stanislaus County Partnership: Over a period of five years, G&A worked with Modesto City Schools and Stanislaus County Office of Education, the Community College System, the Housing Authority, the Police, Probation Department, Social Services, and Public Health to knit together a sustainable network of school linked services that served as a model to the State. Schools had services operating late into the evening and on weekends, offered parent education and job development services; co-located health and dental services; created a wide range of educational enrichment and recreation services; and generated a community wide network of community volunteers who served as ‘block parents.’

Homeless Continuum of Care Development: G&A facilitated research and planning for the development of both Alameda and Contra Costa County’s Continuum of Homeless Services. In Alameda County, this involved developing the plan for acquiring and renovating a handful of large downtown hotels that had been damaged by the Loma Prieta earthquake and creating a network of SRO’s linked to supportive services. In Contra Costa County, G&A served as the ‘grants coordinator’ for three years, generating tens of millions of dollars in grant funding and helping to transform a largely fragmented array of service providers into a cohesive system of services.

Welfare Reform: Research and design an innovative workforce development initiative for new immigrants who did not speak English and were unfamiliar with the mores of the local culture. The project utilized a network of cultural organizations that operated in Oakland working under the direction of the East Bay Agency for Local Development Corporation (EBALDC). During the design phase, G&A convened focus groups with potential customer of this system to identify the kinds of linguistic, cultural, and experience barriers that might impede their integration into the workforce. Using this data and interviews with potential employers, G&A designed a site-based job coaching system that utilized trained bilingual staff recruited from the cultural organizations who then worked with program participants at the work site for the first two weeks of employment. The project was part of Alameda County’s Welfare to Work initiative and effectively created a pipeline from the community to employers using cultural intermediaries.