The Center for Cooperative Development and Solidarity (CDDS) was first convened in November 2015 by Latino immigrant residents of East Boston concerned about the rapid gentrification of our neighborhood. It started with a few conversations, first among a small group of people displaced from a neighborhood apartment building and grew into dozens of immigrant residents that met for months trying to find solutions to the accelerated displacement of people of color. Many people from that original group started CCDS in March 2016. They are now CCDS's steering committee members, groups exploring coops members and  working team (staff).CCDS sees cooperative ownership as a way to gain community capital, create new jobs, and promote decent and livable incomes. We envision that cooperatives will create an alternative economic system that will help low income immigrants make their own pathways out of poverty and stay in the neighborhood they helped build.