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Sr. Assoc, Fed Funding and Technical Assist
PolicyLink is seeking a Senior Associate to support the Bloomberg American Sustainable Cities (BASC) initiative, a program designed to cultivate community-driven partnerships with city governments and local elected leaders to advance racial wealth equity and climate-related outcomes for Black populations. This position, available immediately, is an exciting opportunity to join the staff at PolicyLink. The Senior Associate provides leadership and facilitation within the BASC Content Learning and Strategy Support (CLASS) workstreams, which include a cross-sector, multi-organization team charged with providing the strategic direction and operational support to implement the learning communities and technical assistance efforts of the program. The Senior Associate reports to the Director of Policy and Technical Assistance, who oversees learning programming, technical assistance, and data measurement.
BASC is a national initiative that invests in transformational local solutions at the intersection of climate change and racial wealth equity by strengthening the capacity of relationships between cities and communities to co-create and implement solutions. The initiative will prioritize deep investment over three years in 25 cities with significant Black populations and high levels of climate vulnerability and racial wealth inequity. PolicyLink serves as the lead partner for BASC and will coordinate the efforts of national, regional, and local partners to implement a portfolio of community engagements.
The Senior Associate has operational responsibilities and serves as a critical point of information sharing, analysis, and leadership across BASC partners. By working in collaboration with the team, especially the technical assistance advisors, project managers, subject-matter experts, and consultants, the Senior Associate will collaborate on the design of technical assistance, as well as implementation and coordination. The Federal Funding and TA Senior Associate will be PolicyLink’s lead of the TA program, helping local governments and community-based partners navigate, partner, and apply for funding opportunities to develop innovative climate solutions that advance the goal of racial wealth equity. This work will be critical to advancing the larger BASC goals to help generate racially equitable and impactful outcomes in the movement toward an equitable, resilient, and sustainable nation.
This position is a three-year termed position with the possibility of being renewed, dependent on funding and program needs.
Team Leadership
Working closely with the Policy Director to translate the program’s adopted strategy into a strategy for Federal Funding and TA support that takes an intersectional approach to climate and racial wealth equity initiatives.
Coordinating with a cross-organizational team of staff and consultants responsible for designing and delivering the federal funding support and broader technical assistance, while maintaining alignment with data and evaluation, policy development, and field implementation teams.
Facilitating participatory structures for decision-making and direction across the various teams.
Program Development, Management, and Delivery
Lead analysis and assessment of federal funding opportunities in alignment with racial wealth equity goals for initiative.
Develop policy briefs to assess opportunities for alignment with policy strategies that advance racial wealth equity, including strategies around housing and land use, procurement, business and economic development, water, and equitable infrastructure development.
Coordinate with Policy and TA teams and PolicyLink’s subject-matter teams to support climate investments in furthering racial wealth equity goals.
Engage with CLASS staff, consultants, TA advisors, and program partners to design and deliver engaging virtual and in-person webinars, trainings, and workshops on the successful implementation of specific federal funding programs, grants skills, and approaches to equitable community partnerships at the intersection of climate and racial wealth equity.
Support a group of federal funding technical advisors and coaches who will advise local governments and community partners on how to partner effectively on projects and grant agreements (e.g., equity-centered collaboration methods, developing MOUs, navigating procurement and grant risks, etc.).
Manage the lead consultant to ensure the design of a high-quality ecosystem of TA support for federal funding applications, including but not limited to:
Curating and supporting a bench of federal funding TA providers, specifically ensuring best and maximum use of IIJA/IRA funds and prioritizing the inclusion of Black-owned and/or led TA provider firms and Black TA providers;
Curation of values-aligned TA providers that can support the various needs associated with federal funding support, including, but not limited to, application support, application review support, grant implementation support, grant measurement support and subject-matter expertise support; and
Measuring the success of the TA providers’ services, and providing coaching and support to the lead consultant to adjust for maximum success of the TA providers.
Leverage other partners where possible to provide additional specialized technical assistance to communities.
Help local governments and/or community-based organizations match their BASC projects to appropriate grant opportunities, tax credits, rebates, or Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund financing opportunities.
This position is a three-year termed position with the possibility of being renewed, dependent on funding and program needs.
Program Operations
In collaboration with CLASS leadership, develop and maintain a strategic federal funding work plan that outlines how BASC cities can maximally benefit from federal funding opportunities to advance racial wealth equity and climate justice. This includes designing and managing an ongoing progress reporting process, creating a monitoring and evaluation process, including measuring the success of key federal grant funding awards toward achieving program outcomes.
Co-lead the BASC Federal Funding Working Group and workstream, which includes managing all partner co-leads, collaborators, and advisors to the workstream; delegating workstream tasks; managing deliverables; and holding all relevant project management tasks, including but not limited to:
Managing working group meetings, schedules, agendas, notes, etc.;
Designing, delegating, and organizing tasks in Asana and with other Microsoft Office tools;
Providing weekly progress reports; and
Developing communication materials for cities and partners.
In collaboration with the CLASS staff, design a needs assessment process for the technical assistance needs of cities and CBOs that will ensure necessary information is gathered from cities in the first year of BASC program implementation.
In collaboration with CLASS staff, determine the connection points between the learning communities and the TA bench.
Work with the Communications Director to capture lessons learned and program successes for distribution internally and externally.
Contribute to written briefs, blogs, interviews, videos, and other educational materials that PolicyLink and BASC may develop to broadly share and influence the field.
Learning Culture
Provide information to the Management and Strategy Committee in a timely manner to ensure leadership’s ability to review program outputs, outcomes, and impact indicators for program iteration.
Support the collection and analysis of program analytics for presentation to the program funder and other audiences.
Strategic management of the Racial Equity Results Based Accountability (RE-RBA) collective impact framework for core partners, including regular iterative evaluation of strategies within the framework.
Skills, Abilities, and Knowledge Required
Knowledge and expertise in policy research and analysis.
Knowledge of, and a deep commitment to, social justice and antiracist principles, and an understanding of practices and principles to address racial wealth inequity.
Knowledge of racial equity principles and programs and city climate and sustainability initiatives.
Knowledge of how to advance community and equity-centered sustainability work in local government.
Skill in establishing plans and facilitating work flow for operations of a multi-partner and/or complex programs or organizations.
Skill in decision-making at a leadership level, including assessing risk and using good judgment to inform decisions and recommendations to leadership, and working collaboratively to seize opportunities or solve problems.
Skill in coalition building with an ability to communicate and work effectively with a variety of internal and external stakeholders.
Skilled at facilitating racially diverse multi-partner teams and an understanding of the initiative’s values related to centering Black voices and experiences.
Experience Qualifications
Experience advancing environmental justice efforts, and the ability to solve problems, coach, and guide local governments and community-based partners working to advance racially equitable climate action.
Experience leading racially diverse teams and being part of large, cross-sector, multi-partner initiatives.
Experience developing and implementing public policy programs and initiatives at the intersection of climate action and equity.
Experience working in or with local government.
Experience building, nurturing, and maintaining local government and frontline community relationships and collaboration on grants or other large programs.
Additional Candidate Characteristics
Ability to travel approximately 20% of the time.
High level of communication skills — interpersonal, written, and verbal — and strong relationship-development skills.
Ability to build relationships and productively collaborate with a wide range of partners with different needs, perspectives, and goals.
Expert ability to manage a complex program and multiple projects on different deadlines simultaneously.
Ability to design and facilitate productive meetings, workshops, and training virtually and in-person.
Ability to work independently and with team members in a collaborative and dynamic environment.
Structured thinking with a goal-oriented approach toward program implementation, management, and evaluation while managing inclusive engagement processes.
Engagement, problem-solving, and negotiation techniques and processes.
Assessment and facilitation of complex and/or sensitive situations.
Proficient in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Google Suite, Zoom.
Able to manage a constantly evolving landscape, and shift priorities accordingly.
Passionate about work at the intersection of racial wealth equity and climate change, advancing approaches to community co-creation, and developing strategies to mitigate extraction and harm.
Sense of humor and a passion for prioritizing joy.
The salary range for this position is $90,000 – $133,000, dependent upon experience.
Additionally, PolicyLink provides a generous and comprehensive benefits package that includes medical, dental, vision, 401k match, ancillary benefits, access to Flexible Spending Accounts, commuter expenses, and generous leave benefits.
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