50 Certified Welcoming Cities by 2026
Welcoming America
Start of Project
09/01/2024
End of Project
12/31/2026
Overview
By the end of 2026 - the year the United States reaches its 250th anniversary - Welcoming America will certify 50 cities and counties as Certified Welcoming places, ensuring that an estimated 25 million Americans in places large and small, urban, and rural live in welcoming communities.
Through the Certified Welcoming process, local governments undergo a rigorous assessment using the metrics in the U.S. Welcoming Standard to evaluate progress in establishing inclusive and equitable practices and policies that reduce barriers to participation and support economic opportunity, well-being, civic participation, public safety, and belonging. Participating localities can earn a seal of certification that enables them to promote themselves as welcoming places and build a competitive advantage.
While Certified Welcoming is an established programme with a successful track record, this commitment focuses on expanding the Certified Welcoming programme to reach the milestone of 50 Certified Welcoming places by 2026 through:
Implementing a star system to increase accessibility for local governments of different sizes and with varied resourcing and experience levels to participate.
Development of a peer auditor system and a cohort model to increase peer learning and programme sustainability.
Expected and Achieved Impact
37 U.S. cities and counties are currently Certified Welcoming. An additional 115 U.S. local governments and 150 local civil society organizations participate as members of the Welcoming Network, the learning and doing network convened and supported by Welcoming America, which helps communities advance toward certification.
So far, as a result of the Certified Welcoming program, hundreds of new policies and practices have been implemented by local governments across the United States to advance civic, social, and economic participation, and belonging for all, including people with migrant backgrounds.
An estimated 5,000 individual stakeholders – including refugees, migrants, stateless persons, representatives of civil society and diaspora organizations, residents of receiving communities, local business owners, and local government staff and elected officials – will be engaged and consulted in the process of certification across the 50 localities targeted by 2026.
Lessons Learned
Collaboration is a crucial building block for implementation of effective welcoming infrastructure. Partnering across fields and industries while engaging diverse community members helps create and sustain inclusive policies and environments.
Participants in the Certified Welcoming program – particularly local government technical staff - have provided feedback that its operating framework, the Welcoming Standard, has provided them a roadmap to build a truly welcoming city. (The Welcoming Standard lays out the policies, programs, and processes that local governments must implement in order to consider themselves welcoming.) Participants have reflected that the certification process enabled them to advocate for new investments in, for example, ensuring that people with immigrant backgrounds can open and grow new businesses, participate more fully in the workforce, access services, learn English, participate civically, such as by serving on boards and commissions, and naturalize as US citizens.
Climate resilience and welcoming mandates within local government are often siloed, with departments and initiatives working independently from one another. A few shining examples point to a more interconnected working relationship in the future, but like in many other US communities, this is an area needing improvement in most Certified Welcoming places.
Priority Objectives
Providing access to urban infrastructure, social services, and education,
regardless of status
Realizing socio-economic inclusion
Eliminating all forms of discrimination and promoting evidence-based public discourse
“Local communities know what welcoming looks like for their residents. In places as different as Emporia, Kansas; San Mateo County, California; and New Orleans, Louisiana, local leaders are building inclusion into how their governments work — creating fairer access to services, opportunity, and belonging for everyone, regardless of where they are born. Certified Welcoming offers a shared national standard that helps localities across the United States measure progress and learn from each other, but the work is driven locally, shaped by each community’s own priorities and voice.”