This December 2025 report from the Social Justice Lawyering Clinic focuses on Philadelphians who put time and energy into caring for neglected and abandoned yards adjacent to their homes. The researchers found that these unpaid “land stewards” make significant contributions to improving their neighborhoods. However, although the Philadelphia Land Bank was created to facilitate the transfer of abandoned and neglected land to people willing to care for it, the Bank is not adequately performing that function. As a result, land stewards often have no opportunity to acquire the land they have stewarded before it is sold at foreclosure or bought by developers. The report concludes with recommendations for ways in which the Land Bank and the City could support the positive work that land stewards are doing.