Developed over a two-year planning process by the Office of the Mayor, numerous city agencies, and eight Baltimore-based universities and hospitals, the Baltimore City Anchor Plan is concrete action plan that defines the mutual commitments of the City and participating anchors in four priority areas: public safety, local hiring, local purchasing, and quality of life. The plan is organized around geographic sectors to encourage collaboration, partnerships, and targeted investments that could produce greater impacts and also to help the City provide information to anchors about ongoing City investments and activities in a more coordinated and comprehensive manner. In 2015, the city awarded grant funding to four projects involving its anchor partners, including an effort spearheaded by Johns Hopkins University and the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) to conduct merchant organizing, business development and recruitment, and marketing in an area suffering from disinvestment.