Urban Food Systems in Flint, Michigan: Identifying Leverage Points

Robert E. Brown is an Associate Director of the Center for Community and Economic Development (CCED), Michigan State University Outreach & Engagement.  He brokers, facilitates and participates in university/community partnerships that are scholarly, community-based, collaborative, responsive, capacity-building for the public good. Staffing the CCED Flint Office, Bob works with community partners across multiple sectors to:

• Co-create systemic engagement platforms that link science and community wisdom for transformational change
• Co-create collaborative platforms with action protocols - iterative, strategic action across community and academic networks
• Framing and operationalizing engagement within developmental and ecological contexts
• Co- create collective impact by combining human development, community development, and economic development

Bob Brown is a husband and father (his son Desmond is in the 8th grade), is a resident of the great city of Flint and a Board Member of WOW Outreach. Bob is also a core team member of the national Strategic Doing Institute, and helped to found Neighborhoods Without Borders - a network of Flint folks working to dismantle systemic and institutional racism.

Bob has a master’s degree in public administration from Western Michigan University.