The Family Economic Opportunity Network (FEON) is a collaboration of organizations in Contra Costa County with a focus on the Eastern region of the county’s cities such as Baypoint, Pittsburg, Antioch, Brentwood, Oakley and Byron. The network is a collaboration of Renaissance Entrepreneurship Center, the Antioch Community Foundation, Pittsburg United Methodist Church, the Family Justice Center and the STS Academy. Its goal is to create sustainable employment for individuals struggling with economic uncertainty and the cascading effects they have on their entire family. Our core values are as follows:
- Building an ecosystem as well as inspiring additional ecosystems for non-profit providers in East Contra Costa county
- Creating collaborations among partners that leverages the strength of each organization and bolsters the collective impact
- Forming neighbor to neighbor based markets that are financially resilient and thrive in a Covid restricted economy
- Interconnecting the trainings offered by partners by joining together family safety, advocacy, job training, faith based organizations, entrepreneurship, small business management and city governments
- Building the capacities of local business owners and supplier diversification to feed into the segments expanded in the region by the Northern Waterfront Economic Development Initiative
A few of the progress benchmarks FEON has achieved:
- Establishing introductory small business courses for East Contra Costa residents through virtual learning clusters
- Creating a Small Business Relief fund, operated by Renaissance, to distribute grant funding to small businesses that have been impacted by the pandemic.
- Hosting an Access To Capital event to publicize Renaissance Entrepreneurship Center’s Contra Costa County Small Business Relief Fund of $575,000 provided by Contra Costa County
