About Community Action
Community Action Agencies such as Mountain Projects are the only nonprofits mandated by federal legislation to serve the poor and disadvantaged. Our agencies share a common mission: to help low-income people become self-sufficient and independent of public programs.
In 1964, the U.S. poverty rate (income-based) included 19 percent of Americans. Rising political forces demanded change. Under a new White House Office of Economic Opportunity (OEO), the concept of the federally-funded, local Community Action Program (CAP)—delivered by a local Community Action Agency (CAA), in a nationwide Community Action Network—would become the primary vehicle for a new, federal War on Poverty.
Lyndon B. Johnson’s landmark Economic Opportunity Act of 1964—drafted by former Peace Corps founding director Sargent Shriver—established Community Action Programs in Title II. In concept, a Community Action Program was defined as a program “…which provides services, assistance, and other activities of sufficient scope and size to give promise of progress toward elimination of poverty or a cause or causes of poverty through developing employment opportunities, improving human performance, motivation, and productivity, or bettering the conditions under which people live, learn, and work.”
In the United States and its territories, Community Action Agencies (CAA) are local private and public non-profit organizations that carry out the Community Action Program (CAP), which was founded by the 1964 Economic Opportunity Act to fight poverty by empowering the poor as part of the War on Poverty.
“Somehow you never forget what poverty can do when you see its scars on the hopeful face of a young child. I never thought … in 1928, that I would be standing here in 1965. It never occurred to me in my fondest dreams that I might have the chance to help the sons and daughters of [the students I taught in 1928] and to help people like them all over this country. But now I do have that chance — and I’ll let you in on a secret — I mean to use it.”
CAAs are intended to promote self-sufficiency, and they depend heavily on volunteer work, especially from the low-income community. The Community Services Block Grant (CSBG) is the agencies’ core federal funding. Agencies also operate a variety of grants that come from federal, state and local sources. These grants vary widely among agencies, although most CAAs operate Head Start programs, which focus on early child development. Other programs frequently administered by Community Action Agencies include Low-Income Home Energy Assistance (LIHEAP) utility grants and Weatherization Assistance Program (WAP) funded through the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).
Each CAA is governed by a board of directors consisting of at least one-third low-income community members, one-third public officials, and up to one-third private sector leaders. This board structure is defined by federal statute and is known as a tripartite board.
There are currently over 1,000 CAAs, engaged in a broad range of activities; typical activities include promoting citizen participation, providing utility bill assistance and home weatherization for low-income individuals, administration of Head Start pre-school programs, job training, operating food pantries, and coordinating community initiatives.