More than Casework Services – Getting to Root Causes

“We learned a lot from you and we are in the process of changing how we handle financial requests we receive. Thank you again.” –Lee Street Christian Reformed Church Deacons shared this with our our Congregation Connections Team this past year. Lee Street CRC is pictured above (photo credit to Troy Meekhof, @MidJulyMedia). No day is quite the same in the Congregation Connections’ program at Access. The phone stays busy, and there is a constant of flurry of emails and check requests. Why all the activity? In the past year our Congregations Connections team worked with 100 partner churches to serve […]

Broad Based Community Organizing

Today marked the beginning of a new, formalized relationship between Access and the Micah Center! After many years of shared hopes and visions for a just future, we are now taking official steps towards a working partnership. This relationship was kicked off during today’s staff meeting as we gained an understanding of Broad-Based Community Organizing (BBCO) under the guidance of Micah Center’s Director Allison Colberg. Allison centered the meeting around introducing BBCO as a concept generally and locally, defining it as the action of building the capacity of community members towards leadership and creating change. To do so, we first had to understand […]