Christine launches The Collective Resilience: We Rise Podcast

The Collective Resilience: We Rise features solutions-seekers, change-makers, and those creating a resilient future. We share stories and strategies to inspire action to build resilience and community transformation. To create change, people need to feel like they belong and that they are part of a growing movement. They need to know their voice matters and that they have the inspiration, agency and ability to transform their communities. They are the key to a resilient future.

From the Navajo Nation to the mountains of Appalachia, incredible work is being done by community members. Change is often sparked by inspiration: seeing what others have done, especially in similar communities. People see that when someone looks like them or lives in a place like theirs, and has created real, true and lasting change, change that will allow their granddaughters and grandsons to thrive — they begin to imagine what might be possible in their own communities. No longer waiting for someone else to come and save them, they realize they are the ones they have been waiting for. But what creates that spark? What creates that inspiration? Learning through stories and examples, feeling a sense of agency and belonging, and getting fired up to kick ass creates that spark.

We Rise will help community leaders and members learn to forge a new path toward creating resilience and true transformation. One person at a time, one community at a time, one region at a time, the quilt of transformation can grow piece by piece until resilience becomes the norm instead of the exception. Together, we rise.

Visit the website to learn more and listen in: https://yeswerise.org/

Christine and Reed of Dialogue + Design are featured in this C-Ville’s article: “How does your garden grow?”

An interview with Christine about their permaculture homestead in central Virginia shows the connection Reed and Christine have with the land and permaculture principles: observing natural conditions (like water flow, sun, wind, and wildlife), and designing in a way that protects and mimics those systems.

“Permaculture suggests dividing a property into “zones” based on how often you’ll frequent each area. Most people usually stick close to their dwellings, so gardens will get more attention if they’re in that zone one or two. Gyovai and Muehlman cultivate a kitchen garden for veggies, intentionally sited very close to their house. “They are largely keyhole-shaped beds designed to maximize growing areas and minimize pathways,” says Gyovai, adding that the compost pile is also in zone one, right next to the kitchen garden. “It’s easy to run outside and pop things in the compost. That fosters energy cycling and recycling.”
Read the whole article by Erika Howsare here.

Strengthening Economic Resilience in Appalachia guidebook and report

Dialogue + Design, in partnership with Downstream Strategies and Pennsylvania State University, conducted the Strengthening Economic Resilience in Appalachia project, sponsored by the Appalachian Regional Commission. The project explores and documents strategies and policies local leaders can use to enhance the future economic prospects of coal-impacted communities throughout the Appalachian Region. Dialogue + Design spearheaded the qualitative outreach for this project, which explores and documents strategies and policies local leaders can use to enhance the future economic prospects of coal-impacted communities throughout the Appalachian Region. The four key components to this research project, including developing a comprehensive, quantitative framework to explore economic resilience; identifying a series of best-practice strategies for strengthening local economic resilience; conducting up to 10 in-depth case studies; and developing a guidebook that interprets and integrates findings of the research for local economic development practitioners.

The study was done as part of ARC’s POWER Initiative. POWER, which stands for Partnerships for Opportunity and Workforce and Economic Revitalization, aims to help areas suffering from coal industry-related job losses by helping them diversify their economies. ARC was particularly interested in how communities demonstrate resilience in the face of dramatic economic disruptions. This interest is also reflective of ARC’s mission to innovate, partner and invest to build community capacity and strengthen economic growth in Appalachia.See the full practitioner guidebook and technical report at: www.arc.gov/resilience

National Economic Transition Platform Released!

Dialogue + Design Associates has been delighted to work with a group of leaders from coal-impacted communities across the country to create the National Economic Transition Platform.  With support and leadership from the Just Transition Fund, this group of community leaders, labor organizers, members of tribal nations, and practitioners worked for more than a year to develop the platform and its seven core pillars to build healthy, diverse, resilient economies.  You can read more here https://nationaleconomictransition.org or download the PDF of the platform.