New Co-Design Funding Opportunity for Community-based Organizations ✨The People’s Money: Designed by Community

The Service Design Studio is partnering with the Civic Engagement Commission’s People’s Money to connect the dots between two participatory initiatives!

About Designed by Community

Designed by Community (DxC) is a program of the Service Design Studio (‘the Studio’) at the New York City Mayor’s Office for Economic Opportunity. DxC is a fellowship and project funding opportunity based on redistributing power back to community members with lived experience. In each cohort, the Studio partners with one community-based organization to hire DxC Fellows, community leaders with lived experience. Together the team works to design and develop hyper-localized solutions for their neighborhood.

About the Opportunity

For this year’s Designed by Community Program, we’re partnering with the People’s Money (the Civic Engagement Commission’s participatory budgeting program) to connect the dots between two participatory initiatives!

While ‘Thẹ People’s Money’ determines what projects get funded, ‘Designed by Community’ (DxC) hires community members to determine how the project gets implemented.

The organization selected to implement the Youth Entrepreneurship Program in Manhattan will participate in The People’s DxC Fellowship Pilot Program.

This selected organization will receive:

• Funding to implement the DxC Fellowship ($80K) & the project ($150K).
• Facilitation support (from the Service Design Studio)
• An extended timeline (1 year + 10 months total)

Applying organizations must

• Be a non-profit (501c3), incorporated organization, or M/WBE status to apply.
• Deliver fellowship activities and implement the project to serve residents in the designated Manhattan TRIE neighborhoods: Morningside Heights, Hamilton Heights, and Central Harlem.

✍️Apply by September 7th!

Apply by September 7th. Help shape how future People’s Money projects can incorporate community-led planning at scale!

• Read the People’s DxC Fellowship Request for Information (RFI): bit.ly/ThePeoplesDxC-2025-RFI
• Apply for the RFI: on.nyc.gov/rfi

💬 Sign up for an info-session to learn more

• August 8th, 2025 at 10am — Register here
• August 13th, 2025 at 1pm — Register here

Want to learn more about DxC? Read about last year’s cohort!

This post was published by the Service Design Studio in the Mayor’s Office for Economic Opportunity. The Studio works to make city services more effective, accessible, and dignified for low-income New Yorkers.