Studying community engagement provides another lens for examining how neoliberal universities collaborate with external organizations to move closer to the market, often in the hope of promoting the public good. This study examined the tension between the public and private aspects of university-community partnerships by studying the impact of neoliberal policies and logic on the design and implementation of these partnerships at two land-grant universities. Findings suggest that community engagement scholars and practitioners need to be sensitive to pressures from declining resources and their influences on higher education, including their impacts on community partnerships. In response to pressures to generate revenue and capture external resources, scholars and practitioners must balance reproducing dominant paradigms, developing quasi-market partnerships, and promoting public good through engagement practices.