During this, our 50th anniversary year, we’re sharing 50 reason to celebrate Center for Neighborhoods — one reason each week. The posts come from different stakeholders in the organization, representing our past, present, and future.
Asset-Based Community Development is a core tenet of our work at Center for Neighborhoods. It focuses our lens on the pieces of a community that make it tick, and it asks us to build our understanding of community from the richest material a place has to offer: its assets. At CFN we consider neighbors the absolute greatest asset to every community. As the heart and soul, they know their neighborhoods best and deepest, and we count on their generosity of time and knowledge to help us help Louisville’s neighborhoods become what neighbors envision.
In case you missed it, April was National Volunteer Month, but around here we celebrate and honor our volunteers everyday. As much community organizing and community engagement work as we do here at CFN, the real stars of our neighborhood transformations around the city are the neighbors themselves.
Center for Neighborhoods has long been committed to community-driven work. Whether we’re installing a mural or reinventing a city block, each step of our projects is dictated by the neighbors who show up and generate enthusiasm and solidarity within their community to improve quality of life in Louisville’s neighborhoods. Those selfless volunteers are at the center of everything we do, and we truly could not do this work without them.
So thank you to our volunteers: you educate us, you give us direction, you inspire us to engage the neighbors that build great neighborhoods.
If you are interested in rallying your neighbors to change or improve something in your neighborhood, we encourage you to come learn with us at our biannual Neighborhood Institute. If you and your neighbors need help moving a project forward, please reach out to your CFN Neighborhood Liaison.