Community Heart & Soul

Discover how Community Heart & Soul can benefit your community.

The Community Foundation of South Puget Sound believes strong communities are shaped by the people who live in them. We are launching Community Heart & Soul in the South Puget Sound because we want to support towns in Lewis, Mason, and Thurston counties as they build local capacity, strengthen relationships, and create resident-led plans for the future.

This opportunity is for communities ready to bring residents, nonprofits, and local government together to listen deeply, identify sharedvalues, and act on what matters most.

What is Community Heart & Soul

Community Heart & Soul is a resident-driven process that engages residents across an entire town in identifying what they love most about their community, what future they want for it, and how to achieve it.

Developed and field-tested over a decade in partnership with over 140 small cities and towns across the United States, Community Heart & Soul is a proven process for engaging a community in shaping its future through broad resident participation.

Based on three powerful principles—involve everyone, focus on what matters most, and play the long game—Community Heart & Soul helps towns move toward а brighter, more prosperous future by bringing community residents closer together.

Community Heart & Soul is unique in how it engages residents. The process is designed to reach beyond the usual voices and hear from people throughout the community, including residents who may not typically participate in public meetings, planning processes, or local decision-making. Instead of bringing residents to the table, Community Heart & Soul brings the table to residents at community events, neighborhood block parties, schools, businesses, faith communities, and virtual gatherings.

The Community Foundation of South Puget Sound is launching Community Heart & Soul in the South Puget Sound to help Lewis, Mason and Thurston County towns build community through a resident-driven process and act on what matters most locally.

Hundreds of communities across the country have implemented the program and experiencedoutcomes such as:

1. Increased participation in local community-decision making
2. Increased volunteerism
3. Increased investment in community-supported programs and activities
4. Increased economic development and downtown revitalization
5. Community endowment funds

How the Community Heart & Soul Opportunity Works

Community Heart & Soul is a two-year opportunity for one selected community to build local capacity for resident engagement, shared decision-making, and community-led action.

This is not a traditional competitive grant program. Instead, the Community Foundation will select one community to participate in the Community Heart & Soul process and provide a combination of funding, coaching, training, and peer learning to support the work.

The selected community will receive up to $40K over two years from the Community Foundation of South Puget Sound and will be required to raise a $10K local match. Funding is intended to support the people, process, and participation needed to carry out Community Heart & Soul, including staffing or project coordination, supplies, marketing and communications, events, and implementation. A project coordinator is required. Community Foundation funds may not be used for capital improvements.

What a Selected Community Receives

The selected community will receive:

• Up to $40K over two years from the Community Foundation of South Puget Sound
• Access to extensive Community Heart & Soul resources and materials
• In-person training on each phase of the Community Heart & Soul model
• One-on-one coaching from a trained Community Heart & Soul Coach
• Participation in a community of practice with other Community Heart & Soul communities
• Support with community network analysis, workplanning, resident engagement, story collection, community value statements, action ideas, and long-term stewardship

Eligibility

• Communities must be located in either Lewis, Mason, or Thurston County with a population below 30,000.
• The selected community must be ready to begin initial training by a mutually agreed upon date and can commit to continuing the Community Heart & Soul process over the next two years.
• The Community Heart & Soul process must be implemented through a partnership between residents, a local nonprofit organization, and the selected community’s municipal government.
• Each application must identify a Community Heart & Soul 501(c)3 convening partner. This role can be filled by either a nonprofit organization or municipal government. If an organization is the convening partner, the organization can be of any size, including grassroots organizations and resident-led community groups. If the organization does not have its own 501(c)3 status, a fiscal sponsor may be used.
• Both the organization and municipal government must each have at least one staff person, or elected official, who will play an active role in the Community Heart & Soul Core Team.
• The municipality and organization must be committed to broad community involvement and invite residents from all backgrounds to actively participate in the Heart & Soul process.