Upward Mobility in Boone County Missouri

Background

Boone County has been selected as one of eight counties or municipalities into the Upward Mobility Cohort. This project received funding from the Urban Institute. This award allowed Boone County to create a Mobility Action Plan focused on reducing racial and ethnic inequities and support upward mobility from poverty. The Urban Institute provided technical assistance to support the use of mobility metrics, which include measures of economic success while also focusing on power and autonomy and being valued in the community. Boone County used these metrics to establish priorities, set targets, and develop the county's Mobility Action Plan.

Local Project

Boone County's Upward Mobility project utilizes Results-Based Accountability (RBA) to drive equity-centered and data-informed decisions. RBA involves community stakeholders at each step of the planning process to guide implementation of intervention strategies identified by the community. Initial priorities for Boone County were set during the Upward Mobility Kickoff event, a data walk, held on August 11, 2021. Data was presented based on the Mobility Metrics and included drivers of upward mobility in the categories of Strong and Healthy Families, Opportunities to Learn and Earn, and Supportive Communities. Community stakeholders identified and reached consensus on priorities to begin the strategic action planning. You can see data for Boone County below.

Initial Priorities

• Strong and Health Families

• Local solutions to support families across the “benefits cliff” as they increase their wages and begin to lose public assistance.

• Opportunities to Learn and Earn

• Improve disparities of literacy scores at third grade.
• Reduce opportunity gaps in workforce development and employment.
• Decreasing referrals to the 13th Circuit Juvenile Office.

• Supportive Communities

• Increase available inclusive housing to reduce and mitigate neighborhood segregation.

Planning Workgroups

From the initial priorities, three priorities were selected for planning for this phase of the project and workgroups were formed. These workgroups were facilitated by stakeholder facilitators who led participants through the RBA process and ultimately supported creation of the Mobility Action Plan. Stakeholder facilitators are local community leaders who have lived experiences and professional expertise in community facilitation. Each workgroup's Mobility Action Plan identified results, indicators to assess progress, root causes, and strategic actions which were developed by planning participants.

Boone County produced a comprehensive Mobility Action Plan and a Community Report which summarizes the full report. Click here to see the full Mobility Action Plan or click here to see the Community Report.

What's Next?

The initial phase of Boone County's Mobility Action Plan has been completed. Workgroups are continuing to meet to refine the plan and to begin implementation of identified strategic actions. Annual updates to the Mobility Action Plan will be shared with the community.

How can I be involved?

If you or your organization would like to learn more or support actions in the Mobility Action Plan, please reach out to communityservices@boonecountymo.org or call 573-886-4298.

Boone County's Mobility Action Plan

Community Update Reports

Mobility Metric Data for Boone County

Each category of upward mobility contains data for Boone County along with additional data and analysis from local sources. All data posters were produced by Boone County Community Services Department and Cradle to Career Alliance.