Fair City Challenge
The Economy League of Greater Philadelphia brought us in to design and manage a citywide challenge for ideas that build home and neighborhood wealth in Philadelphia's historically disinvested communities. We led it from the open call to the Community Showcase.
The challenge
The Economy League's Know Your Price, Philly research put a number on what decades of unequal home appreciation have cost Black and Latino neighborhoods. The next step was harder: finding people with practical ideas to close that gap and giving them the support to test those ideas in real neighborhoods. The Economy League needed a partner to run that process from start to finish.
$24B
Less housing wealth in Black neighborhoods since 1950
$33.4B
Less housing wealth in Latino neighborhoods since 1950
Source: Economy League of Greater Philadelphia, Know Your Price, Philly (2023). Compared with appreciation in white neighborhoods.
What we delivered
Challenge design
A three-track structure covering the home, the neighborhood, and the city, with eligibility, scoring criteria, and a timeline built on the research.
Open call and selection
Outreach, applications, and scoring that narrowed about 75 applications to 14 semifinalist teams.
Pitch competition
A spring pitch competition where the 14 semifinalists presented to judges, who selected four finalists.
Accelerator
Workshops, mentoring, and coaching that helped each finalist team turn its idea into a pilot, backed by a $10,000 award.
Community Showcase
Planning and production for the October 2025 Community Showcase at Independence Blue Cross, where the finalists presented their pilots.
Prize coordination
Coordination of the finalist awards and the grand prize with the Economy League.
The outcome
Four finalist teams built pilots: a platform to challenge biased home appraisals, a fund for energy upgrades on homes in disinvested neighborhoods, a fund that helps Latino investors buy and rehabilitate properties, and a plan to turn vacant land in North Philadelphia into a community farm.
On October 8, 2025, at the Community Showcase, the WEALTH Collective, a team of Black women in real estate, banking, and finance, won the $50,000 grand prize for its platform to take on racial appraisal bias. The challenge was sponsored by TD Bank, Comcast, Independence Blue Cross, and NewCourtland.
“When our partners are planning equity-focused community challenges and they wonder who might help them run it, I recommend Launch Point Labs without hesitation.”
Jeff Hornstein
Executive Director, Economy League of Greater Philadelphia
