City Heights is a very diverse community that's home to hundreds of small businesses, and a new program aims to help those businesses use that diversity to their advantage by building more equitable workplaces.
The program is called LEAPS, which stands for Leadership in Ecosystems, Advancement, Policies, Supervisors, and is operated as a partnership between the City Heights Community Development Corporation and the Kim Center for Social Balance.
The program will work with small business owners in the community to help them incorporate equitable practices into their daily operations.
“Most of our businesses don’t have a coordinated HR department and things like that, so hopefully what this case study will give us is a look at what resources we need,” said City Heights CDC president and CEO Alexis Villanueva.
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Villanueva said the idea is that when individuals thrive in their jobs, the businesses will also thrive.
“You invest in your workers, you invest in your business culture, and the ROI is huge," Villanueva said. "We can create better jobs. Families feel more secure in that. We know our business owners want to provide these resources and so it’s critical to start in a community like this.”
Villanueva said LEAPS is looking for 10-15 City Heights businesses to take part in the case study. Interested business owners can contact the City Heights CDC for more information on how to apply.
