A large group of people sitting on the ground, watching a movie on a big screen during Movies at Clark Park

2025 Annual
Review

In 2025, UCD continued our efforts to create a safe, clean, and attractive neighborhood by investing in the people, places, and services that make our community thrive.

We aided local small business owners through technical assistance and networking opportunities. We helped community groups, regional agencies, and non-profits create new public spaces and safer streets. Our signature event series provided safe, vibrant activities for neighbors and visitors that bolstered our local economy and highlighted our arts and culture scene. Our workforce subsidiary, The Skills Initiative, served 333 Philadelphians in FY25 and helped connect 95.6% of program graduates into meaningful new jobs while supporting our expanding alumni network. We worked with partners to address public safety issues while expanding our critical efforts to support the unhoused in our community. And in the spring of 2025, we debuted a new website that beautifully showcases our mission and impact within the community. Below, explore highlights from our work over the past year. 

Helping Our Small Business Community Prosper

UCD provides extensive support to our local small business community through exclusive events, expert guidance, marketing assistance, and connections to resources. Whether a small business owner needs help with emergency fixes to an existing property, seeks to relocate, or simply requires a dedicated expert who can help navigate the maze of permits and licensing, UCD can help. We held multiple networking events where we brought small business owners together to connect over shared successes and frustrations, offering opportunities to connect directly with representatives who could help with financing, marketing, licensing, and many other topics necessary to support their businesses. At one of these events, we connected with Kashmiera Harris, a local business owner seeking support for her daycare A Secure Future Academy, andassisted the owners of Lulu Café when they wanted to relocate to their new location on 40th Street, offering support with readying the space from start to finish, including financing, construction guidance, and partnership structure. Two years after helping them open, we helped guide the owners of Cleo’s Bagels as they sought to expand their successful operation into an adjoining storefront to increase their shop’s footprint. And we offered permitting assistance to Dollar Stroll vendors like Chef Sunflower from BTW It’s Vegan, helped promote dozens of business openings, and even lent storefront space to local makers as we hosted the organizers of MEANTIME Philadelphia in a vacant space during the slower summer months.

People browse through local art at the Meantime market

Meantime’s West Philly Bizarre

UCD’s Ryan Spak with the Lulu Cafe team

Meantime’s West Philly Bizarre

“UCD played a huge role in helping my business grow. Through the events I’ve participated in and attended, I’ve had so many networking opportunities and met some truly amazing people. I’ve gained new catering opportunities, connected with people who invited me to other vendor events, and really expanded my reach. I truly appreciate everything UCD has done for me and my business.”

Shon "Chef Sunflower" Emanuel

Owner of BTW It's Vegan, Dollar Stroll Community Vendor

Serving Our Neighbors, from the Unhoused to Daily Community Stewardship

At UCD, we serve the neighborhood daily through the cleaning, greening, and safety services we provide throughout the district. We partner with local law enforcement agencies to develop deployment strategies for our teams of Safety Ambassadors, we respond to community needs by maintaining public trash cans and removing graffiti, and we beautify the neighborhood with street sweeping and with plantings maintained by our Green Team. The strong and necessary work of our Homeless Outreach Services Team (HOST) expanded in 2025 as we added additional staff, procured new uniforms, and organized events, such as a day of free haircuts for people in need. HOST’s hard work is paying off like in the case of a community member named Chris, who found himself living on the streets until we helped him obtain a voucher, secure temporary housing, and guided him through the process of reinstating a suspended driver’s license and putting him on a path to stability.

Tons of Trash Collected

Walking Escorts

Lockouts and Jumpstarts

Special Safety Checks

“Our annual Spruce Hill Halloween Parade would not be the same without the UCD ambassadors. Not only do they help bring a sense of safety to all the participants, but they also bring an infectious enthusiasm that helps brighten the mood. We truly appreciate their support each year to make Halloween a success.”
Evan Johnstone, Spruce Hill Community Association

Bolstering Our Efforts for Safer Streets

As continued development and more jobs arrive in our neighborhood, UCD has been hard at work identifying, addressing, and publicizing transit issues, including traffic chokepoints, transit disruptions, and unsafe conditions for people moving through our community. We’ve built our capacity to conduct responsive, in-house research, and released a series of new reports: a look into travel patterns; an explainer on the impacts of pedestrian and daylighting plazas; and a recent report co-authored with the City’s Office of Transportation and Infrastructure Systems (OTIS) to identify short-and-long-term interventions to traffic congestion, which will serve as the foundation for a robust transportation planning effort in the year ahead. We’ve continued to develop partnerships with neighbors to identify areas requiring streetscape interventions, acting as consultants and project managers to introduce daylighting plazas at 43rd and Spruce for families accessing the nearby Penn Alexander School and at 36th and Lancaster in Powelton Village, a key crossing point for students at the Samuel Powel School and SLAMS located at 36th and Warren.

Creating a Sense of Community and Shared Joy Through Signature Events

Our marketing and events teams presented another robust calendar of events in 2025 to spark joy, draw visitors to experience the best our neighborhood has to offer, and create connections to the local small business community. Highlights included our 10th year of presenting Movies in Clark Park, an expansion of our University City Summer Series concerts at the Lawn at uCity Square, a collaboration with the organizers of the All Love Block Party to bring more local performers to the Dollar Stroll, and a collection of networking events for local professionals and small business operators. When not producing our own events, we heavily promoted the amazing performances, parades, art exhibitions, and productions presented by our partners throughout the district using our social channels, dedicated event emails, and our revamped community calendar. We look forward to our biggest year yet, contributing to the citywide efforts to make 2026 an unforgettable year in Philadelphia.

“This was our first year working with UCD on the Baltimore Ave Dollar Stroll, and it was an incredible experience. Being able to collaborate and create spaces like this for the community is so important, especially when it feels like the world is focused on divisiveness. These events give people the opportunity to truly connect with the community, their neighbors, and experience the true spirit of Philadelphia. We look forward to continuing to work with UCD in the future!”
Melvin Powell III, Sync Production Group + All Love Block Party

Serving as Leaders and Partners to Improve the Public Realm

At UCD, we believe neighbors deserve high-quality public spaces, which is why we are committed to serving as leaders and partners on public space activations and improvements. We served as consultants on projects including the Clark Park Plan, which was approved to proceed with $1.4 million in upgrades, we collaborated with the Walnut Hill Community Association to raise funds and begin work to rehabilitate the Walnut Hill Community Playground, and we lent our expertise to community groups seeking to duplicate our efforts. On October 31st, we officially ended our long stewardship of The Porch at 30th Street Station as it officially turned over to Amtrak as part of their 30th Street Station District plan, but much of the signature furniture has found new homes, including at the Lea School and the Lawn at uCity Square. The lessons we’ve learned from our 14 years of managing The Porch have influenced all of our subsequent public spaces, including Trolley Portal Gardens and the forthcoming West Philly Waterfront, which continues inching its way toward reality.

“University City District has been an invaluable partner to the Friends of Clark Park, from hosting summer movies to supporting park cleanups and other essential services. Its support has been crucial in advancing our park-rejuvenation efforts, with Nate Hommel, UCD’s Director of Planning and Design, helping us draft and secure approval for our playground RFP, a major step toward breaking ground.”

Ben Sirolly

President, Friends of Clark Park

A group of Skills Initiative graduates pose with their certificates.

Expanding the Impact of The Skills Initiative Across the City, Region, and Nation

The Skills Initiative, UCD’s workforce subsidiary, enjoyed another successful year of connecting Philadelphians to career opportunities with major employers while expanding the scope of our work and partnerships. In the spring, we published a white paper on the critical importance of job quality as a driver of both economic growth and workforce development. This fall, we partnered with Accelerator for America to make a Clinton Global Initiative Commitment to Action to share our proven model with mayors and leaders from across the country so they can replicate our success in their own communities in the coming year. In its first full year, our Keystone LifeSci Collaborative (KLSC) made strides in connecting regional life sciences leaders, providing resources and guidance to workers affected by layoffs, and advancing strategies to attract additional talent. In September, we launched our second industry partnership, the Healthcare Collaborative of Greater Philadelphia, bringing together industry leaders across regional health systems to solve talent challenges and build equitable talent pipelines into and throughout the industry. The Skills Initiative also explored new partnership models with Penn Medicine and SEPTA—learn more about our longstanding partnership with SEPTA to train Bus Operators in the video above!

The Skills Initiative By The Numbers graphic

“My experience with The Skills Initiative has been truly rewarding. The relationships and connections I’ve made are ones I value and plan to carry with me long-term. The program has given me a clearer vision for my career journey and helped me grow both personally and professionally. I’m grateful for the support, encouragement, laughs, and knowledge I’ve gained, especially from the Skills Initiative network with peers, which made the experience even more meaningful.”
July 2025 UPenn FRES Cohort Graduate

Additional Supports for Skills Initiative Alumni, Including an Affordable Housing Pilot Pioneered by UCD

Alumni like Stephanie, featured in the video above, have received continued support through networking events, new programs and scholarship opportunities, and the creation of our first-ever Alumni Council made up of program alumni seeking to serve an active role with their peers. In January of 2025, we launched a new affordable housing pilot that connects Skills Initiative alumni with vetted landlords offering high-quality, affordable housing options. A team built of UCD and Skills Initiative staff, working with local landlords, has provided resources, support, and connections for our alumni network, resulting in 11 successful placements of alumni in affordable units. Our support for alumni will revive an additional boost in the coming years thanks to a $690,000 award from the William Penn Foundation we received in November.

Continuing the Upward Trajectory of Landscaping Social Venture Green City Works

Our landscaping social venture Green City Works (GCW) continued its mission to provide job opportunities for crewmembers facing barriers to employment while providing excellent services to our expanding list of clients. In the spring, the excellent work of GCW was acknowledged when Highline Park at Schuylkill Yards, a dog park and public space built in collaboration with Brandywine Realty Trust, Viridian Landscape Studio, and GCW, was selected as a finalist in ULI Philadelphia’s Awards for Excellence in the Open Space category. GCW crewmembers also significantly contributed to the ongoing renovation of the Walnut Hill Community Playground, which broke ground in April thanks to grant money from the Target Foundation and has made significant progress including the completion of a new retaining wall and the planting of a native garden. In the coming year, GCW crews will offer training and guidance to burgeoning landscapers through partnerships with the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society, collaborate with the City’s Taking Care of Business Clean Corridors Program, lead the renovation and transformation of the iconic Singing Fountain in South Philadelphia’s East Passyunk neighborhood, and add additional features to the playground at Walnut Hill such as furniture, trash cans, bike racks, exercise stations, and shade structures.