Zora’s House Awarded Additional $100,000 Grant by Campus Partners

The Zora’s House construction project is brought further to completion with an additional $100,000 grant. Campus Partners had previously awarded a $300,000 grant to Zora’s House at the beginning of the project’s conception in 2022. The pioneering coworking space and leadership incubator had been constructing a new 10,000-square-foot operations and community center at the corner of North 4th Street and East 8th Avenue in the Weinland Park neighborhood. Campus Partners has been an ardent supporter of Zora’s House and the programming it provides to women and gender-expansive people of color.

When the construction project experiences cost escalations and delays, Campus Partners was happy to provide additional assistance to insure the completion of the project. Zora’s House 2.0 is now finished and will celebrate its grand opening on August 29th.

Expansion of Zora’s House and its mission are critical to continuing the successful transition of the historic Weinland Park neighborhood east of the OSU campus from a once-neglected low-income area to a thriving and diverse mixed-income community with an emphasis on keeping existing long-term residents in their homes.

As a gathering space and community partner, Zora’s House will be well positioned to fill many residents’ social and programming needs. Specifically, 45 percent of Weinland Park residents are people of color and nearly half are women.

Zora’s House has helped more than 3,000 women of color connect with health resources, deal with job losses, learn leadership skills and launch new businesses. In just the last year, the Her Way business builder program of Zora’s House helped more than 30 women of color start new profitable enterprises. 

In its expanded location, Zora’s House will be able to offer women of color owned startups with commercial and event space to launch their businesses at half the current market rates. The four Women of Color Owned (WoCO) Markets already organized and hosted by Zora’s House have brought in more than $75,000 for women of color operators. The Campus Partners grant adds to more than $1.3 million in support already pledged for the Zora’s House expanded footprint and programming growth.