1 Network-Centric Approach to Place Based Community Building Lessons Guiding Principals Our Form Our Practice

What is “Community?” At the cellular level - ‘The exchange of value that comes from a single relationship of trust and mutual support’ In Place - The aggregate of these relationships form a connected environment which is not ‘community’ but the infrastructure for community It is the functionality that emerges from this infrastrucuture – the ability to act, plan, solve problems, adapt well to change, embrace newcomers, collectively comfort and individually be known, that is “community ”

What is Community Building? We are community building when we act to optimize the value of place in two primary ways: Stimulate Grassroots economic mobilization fueled by the unleashing of latent value relationships Foster functional democracy as defined by the principal of “consent by the governed” which is the cornerstone of liberty and the best chance for social and economic justice.

“Environment”: surrounding conditions, influences, or forces, by which living forms are influenced and modified in their growth and development. Like in all nature – human environments Feed certain things and Starve other things. The question for us…”what are we feeding and what are we starving?” Our Guiding Principal: Cultivating New Human Environments that Support: Pursuit of valueProductivityRelationships of Trust ChoiceMutual SupportJoy Generosity CreationFun Lesson: People exist in environments, not organizations or groups of organizations

Global Economy Information Technology Increased Mobility Increased Diversity “Time” & “Space” are still relevant and impactful elements of our environment. This makes “Place” important. Technology’s ability to diminish time and space as relevant and impactful has increased but is also commodified. For poor people, “place” remains one of the most important environmental factors for quality of life and economic Success. 21 st Century Environmental Factors That further influence the ‘Value of Place’ Lesson: Place has changed as a factor in the lives of most people. Our Guiding Principal: “Community Building is a process of grass roots mobilization, where the goal is to ‘optimize the value of place’ in the lives of struggling families and individuals…”

Structural forms of human engagement are invented to compensate for: absence of relationships of trust and value, real and perceived imbalances of power Real and percieved complexities of implementation In the community setting, entrenched habits of organization assume structural solutions. But the forms are over engineered and inhibit the development of relationships of trust and value reinforce real and perceived imbalances of power, and favor process over action (the ‘who are we’ over the ‘what should we do together’) Lesson: In community organizing and community building and in many Movements we have a fetish for structural forms to our detriment. Our Guiding Principal: “FORM FOLLOWS FUNCTION and in community Open Architecture Forms that are provisional, informal, action oriented and seek perpetual access are best.”

Lesson: Environmental factors are shifting the nature of ‘belonging’ and the preferred forms of affiliation and membership Our Guiding Principal: Low level Affiliation based on Value and Choice is the optimal membership environment for most people. Long Term Commitment High Level of Affiliation/Identity Highly Structured Choice Low Level of Affiliation/Identity Flexibility

Helping Each Other Through Mutual Support Engaging in Collective Action Building Family Assets Our Objective: Get Thousands in the Game - Build A Network- Centric Environment filled with Lawrence Families and Providers Who are: Membership In the Network: NOT a club for NEEDY PEOPLE, but an environment filled with ambitious, creative people who are “working on their stuff” and Engaged in Public Life

NeighborCircles Family Asset Building Homeownership Center Union Crossing Project Team Movement City Youth Network Reviviendo Gateway District Team City-Wide Budget Campaign Voter-Edge Member+Link Guides Scribes Connectors PODER Leadership Institute Reviviendo Fellows Program Membership Team FAB Team Campus Residency Program Our Form: A Big Room With Many (Different) Doors Accessible Membership Threshold Benefits Programs/Projects Function as “Doors” Earned Benefits for Experienced Members Staff and Members as Weavers

Club-Like Membership Structure Culture of Organic Engagement Proposition Not Programs BUT Value Propositions Resonance Testing Many Doors Open Architecture Informality Provisionality Felxibility “Let it Go” Focus on Cohorts Network Nights NeighborCircles Peer Leadership and weaving Peer To Peer Connections Form Follows Function Low Level Affiliation Value/Choice Driven The Give/Get Compact Exploring The Network Form – A Value & Demand Driven Environment Information-Rich Interactive Spaces Leader as “Weaver”