St. Louis Park Named
One of the Nation's 100 Best Communities for Young People

Competition Showcases Successful Efforts by U.S. Cities and Towns to Help Young People Succeed
America's Promise Alliance (the Alliance), the nation's largest alliance dedicated to children and youth, in partnership with Capital One, today announced that St. Louis Park has once again been named a winner of its 2008 100 Best Communities for Young People (100 Best) competition. The 100 Best competition recognizes the 100 outstanding communities across America—large and small, rural and urban—that are the best places for young people to live and grow up. More than 300 communities in all 50 states applied for the honor this year.

St. Louis Park is recognized as one of 100 Best for a third year, in part, because of the city's work to introduce its young people to the arts. The Friends of the Arts program works to ensure young people have access to art and culturalexperiences. The program provides youth with donated musical instruments and holds creative writing classes for teens. In addition, the Lake Forest Neighborhood's Arts Crawl sponsors family art programs and the Lutheran Church of the Reformation works with young artists, giving them a place to perform and display their art. The city also invites young people to participate in decision making on special neighborhood and community issues.

"The prosperity of every community and this country depends on how well we care for our children and youth," said Marguerite W. Kondracke, president and CEO, America's Promise Alliance, "Although no place is perfect, when we have communities that make young people a priority and are working to make sure they stay in school and have all the resources necessary to lead healthy, productive lives, we must recognize them and by extension inspire other cities and towns to follow their lead."

"At Capital One, we are committed to building stronger communities, one neighborhood at a time," said Carolyn Berkowitz, Vice President of Community Affairs for Capital One. "That's why we're proud to partner with the Alliance on the 100 Best competition to recognize the tremendous work in communities across the country to create environments where children and families have boundless opportunities as well as the support systems necessary to champion their growth and encourage their success."

The 100 Best competition was first held in 2005. This year's winners were selected by a distinguished panel that included some of the nation's most well-known civic, business and nonprofit leaders such as: Gayle Manchin, first lady of West Virginia, United Way President Brian Gallagher, former Mayor of Denver and President of Webb Group International, Wellington Webb, Thomas Donohue, president and CEO, U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Carol Coletta, president and CEO, CEOs for Cities, Christine James-Brown, president and CEO, the Child Welfare League of America, and Dr. Suzanne Morse, executive director of the Pew Partnership for Civic Change.

"This honor, for a third year in a row, is a real testament to this community," said St. Louis Park Mayor Jeff Jacobs. "We're extremely proud of our youth, and I am continually impressed by the adults in this community creating opportunities for our kids. At the end of our lives we can look back and know that we created a place where children could grow and be safe and laugh and work hard and take risks and be better people and help others and in their turn inherit a society and a way of life that was made better because the adults in their lives showed them how to make it better for themselves.

All communities that completed entries in the 100 Best competition were required to submit detailed information to the Alliance on existing community programs and initiatives that help deliver the Five Promises—resources identified by America's Promise as being critical to the development of healthy, successful children: caring adults; safe places; healthy start; effective education; and opportunities to help others; to their young people. Applicants were also asked to describe how different sectors of their community come together to deliver the Five Promises and specific efforts and programs developed to ensure that their young people graduate from high school prepared for college and/or the workforce. Each of these communities, regardless of whether they were selected as a winner, will be eligible to apply for $300,000 in grants from the Alliance next month.

For more details about the 100 Best competition and to see a complete list of the 2008 winners, please visit www.americaspromise.org

SLP keeps Best 100 ranking - MNSUN article

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