The City of Atlanta is working to address significant racial wealth disparities and ensure that all residents benefit from neighborhood revitalization initiatives equitably. The FUSE Executive Fellow will develop a comprehensive neighborhood wealth-building strategy to support economic inclusion and protect legacy residents. Ultimately, this work will create pathways to prosperity, strengthen community resilience, and foster long-term equity in Atlanta’s underserved neighborhoods.

Fellowship Dates: April 28, 2025 – April 24, 2026

Salary: Executive Fellows are FUSE employees and receive an annual base salary of $80,000. Fellows can also access various health, dental, and vision insurance benefits. Compensation for this year of public service is not intended to represent market-rate compensation for the experienced professionals in our program.

ABOUT THE FUSE EXECUTIVE FELLOWSHIP

FUSE is a national nonprofit working to expand social and economic opportunities, particularly for communities that have been limited by a history of systemic and institutionalized racism. FUSE partners with local governments and communities to more effectively address pressing challenges by placing experienced professionals within city and county agencies. These FUSE Executive Fellows lead strategic projects designed to advance racial equity and accelerate systems change. Since 2012, FUSE has led over 250 projects in 40 governments across 20 states, impacting the lives of 25 million people.

When designing each fellowship project, FUSE works closely with government partners and local stakeholders to define a scope of work that will achieve substantive progress toward regional priorities. FUSE then conducts an individualized search for each project to ensure that the selected candidate has at least 15 years of professional experience, the required competencies for the role, and deep connections to the communities being served. They are data-driven and results-oriented and able to effectively manage complex projects by developing actionable roadmaps and monitoring progress to completion.

Executive Fellows are hired as FUSE employees and embedded in government agencies for at least one year of full-time work. Throughout their fellowships, they receive training, coaching, and professional support from FUSE to help achieve their project goals. FUSE Executive Fellows bring diverse perspectives and new approaches to their projects. They build strong relationships with diverse arrays of stakeholders, foster alignment within.

PROJECT CONTEXT

The City of Atlanta has one of the largest wealth disparities in the country, with White households holding median wealth levels at $238,000 annual income, compared to only $5,000 for Black households. This wealth gap is most evident in predominantly Black neighborhoods, where residents have limited access to wealth-building resources such as capital for small businesses, neighborhood-serving retail, and local employment opportunities. Generations of public policies and private actions have perpetuated racial divisions, leaving many children in these communities with few opportunities for healthy and prosperous lives. In some areas, residents can expect to live 23 years less than those just a few miles away. Without strategic intervention, ongoing private investment and development, there is a risk of displacing long-standing legacy residents, potentially widening the wealth gap and limiting access to shared prosperity.

Atlanta’s neighborhood revitalization efforts seek to address this stark racial wealth gap by prioritizing underserved communities and fostering equitable economic growth. Under Mayor Andre Dickens’ vision to make Atlanta “the best place in the country to raise a child,” the city has launched several initiatives centered on equitable community development. Atlanta is investing in housing, workforce development, youth programs, and infrastructure improvements that build healthy, thriving neighborhoods. One of the mayor’s most prominent revitalization efforts, the Neighborhood Transformation Initiative, is working to leverage public-private partnerships to bring targeted revitalization to high-need neighborhoods, aiming to prevent displacement while ensuring community benefits. The City is now working to integrate this initiative with their new legal authority to condemn blighted properties, enabling the acquisition of underutilized land along key commercial corridors and supporting the development of community-serving spaces in underserved areas.

The FUSE Executive Fellow will create a comprehensive racial wealth-building strategy that aligns with its neighborhood revitalization efforts and ensures legacy residents benefit from community investments. The FUSE Executive Fellow will: conduct a landscape analysis and listening tour with stakeholders, assess community assets and needs, identify opportunities for economic growth, and research best practices in neighborhood wealth-building. Based on these insights, the Executive Fellow will develop a targeted wealth-building strategy and help guide the implementation of a “Main Street” economic initiative along key commercial corridors. Ultimately, this will help advance economic inclusion, create new pathways to prosperity for underserved residents, and foster vibrant, resilient neighborhoods across Atlanta.

PROJECT SUMMARY

Starting in May 2025, the Executive Fellow will begin by conducting a listening tour with key stakeholders, including community leaders, small business owners, nonprofit organizations, and residents of targeted neighborhoods for revitalization efforts. This listening tour will gather perspectives on the needs, aspirations, and challenges within these communities, particularly regarding economic mobility and wealth-building. The Executive Fellow will ensure diverse and inclusive participation, focusing on amplifying the voices of low-income households and communities of color who are most affected by Atlanta’s wealth disparities. Additionally, the Executive Fellow will conduct a landscape analysis of current city policies and practices impacting wealth-building and research successful economic inclusion models from other cities. The Executive Fellow will then develop specific project goals and deliverables for Atlanta’s leadership to review and approve that will guide the remainder of the fellowship.

Using insights from the landscape analysis and listening tour, the Executive Fellow will develop a targeted neighborhood wealth-building strategy. This strategy will outline pathways to foster economic resilience and support local businesses, with a focus on sustainable wealth-building opportunities for legacy residents in historically underserved neighborhoods. It will incorporate key areas of racial wealth-building and community reinvestment best practices, including growing individual assets in distressed areas, building collective neighborhood-based assets, improving access to private capital, supporting legacy and small businesses, enhancing inclusion, and improving financial literacy or credit scores. Additionally, the strategy will include innovative approaches, such as supporting small businesses, expanding entrepreneurship, leveraging large-scale events, implementing neighborhood community trusts, exploring shared-equity ownership models, developing workforce opportunities, and deploying effective economic inclusion interventions. The Executive Fellow will establish systems to monitor and evaluate the impact of this strategy, ensuring alignment with Atlanta’s goals for equitable community revitalization.

The Executive Fellow will then design and oversee implementation of a pilot project under their new strategic plan. This pilot will involve developing a “Main Street” economic initiative along key commercial corridors, which will activate underutilized commercial spaces, support small businesses, and create job opportunities while preserving the cultural heritage of these neighborhoods. The Executive Fellow will implement the project, oversee its conclusion, and conduct feedback collection from stakeholders and performance analysis of the pilot program to refine the final neighborhood wealth building strategy before scaling its implementation.

By the conclusion of the project, the Executive Fellow will have designed a neighborhood wealth-building strategy and an actionable implementation plan for a “Main Street” pilot program. The strategy will include long-term sustainability measures, such as identifying potential funding sources, establishing partnerships, and creating frameworks for ongoing community engagement. Additionally, the Executive Fellow will produce policy recommendations and a monitoring framework for city agencies to track progress over time. To ensure sustainability, the Executive Fellow will work with city leaders to integrate these resources and tools into Atlanta’s broader revitalization efforts, supporting lasting, community-driven economic transformation.

PROJECT DELIVERABLES

By April 2026, the Executive Fellow will have overseen the following:

  • Designed Targeted Neighborhood Wealth-Building Strategy: Delivered a comprehensive action plan in Word and PowerPoint formats, summarizing best practices, current conditions, and local improvement opportunities. This includes mapping existing economic mobility and racial wealth-building initiatives, aligning them with the Neighborhood Transformation Initiative, and identifying opportunities for alignment with other major mayoral priorities.
  • Developed Strategic Recommendations: Developed strategic recommendations for policy, partnerships, programs, and systemic improvements that support economic inclusion and wealth-building, including approaches for growing neighborhood assets, supporting small businesses, and expanding financial access.
  • Conducted Pilot Proposal and Implementation Plan: Created a detailed pilot proposal with a timed implementation plan, including specific actions, partnerships, and resource allocation strategies to activate the “Main Street” initiative along target commercial corridors, with a focus on enhancing local businesses and job opportunities.
  • Produced Pilot Project Summary and Evaluation: Produced a written summary and presentation on the pilot’s outcomes, covering the theory of change, project plans, budget, dependencies, timeline, key partners, outputs, outcomes, lessons learned, and recommendations for future scaling and improvement.
  • Designed Sustainability Toolkit and Monitoring Framework: Developed a toolkit and monitoring framework to support long-term implementation and sustainability, including resources for funding, ongoing community engagement, impact tracking, and alignment with Atlanta’s broader revitalization efforts.

KEY STAKEHOLDERS

  • Executive Sponsor – Courtney English, Chief Policy Officer and Senior Advisor to the Mayor
  • Project Supervisor – Megan Sparks, Senior Advisor to the Mayor, Strategic Partnerships & Strategic Initiatives

QUALIFICATIONS

  • Synthesizes complex information into clear and concise recommendations and action-oriented implementation plans.
  • Develops and effectively implements both strategic and operational project management plans.
  • Generates innovative, data-driven, and result-oriented solutions to complex challenges.
  • Respond quickly to changing ideas, responsibilities, expectations, trends, strategies, and other processes.
  • Communicates effectively verbally and in writing and excels in active listening and conversing.
  • Fosters collaboration across multiple constituencies to support more effective decision-making.
  • Establishes and maintains strong relationships with diverse stakeholders, both inside and outside of government, particularly community-based relationships.
  • Embraces differing viewpoints and implements strategies to find common ground.
  • Demonstrates confidence and professional diplomacy while effectively interacting with individuals at all levels of various organizations.

FUSE is an equal-opportunity employer with core values of diversity, equity, and inclusion. We encourage candidates from all backgrounds to apply for this position.