In celebration of Community Development Week this October, CNHED hosted its first-ever District-wide conference around the topic of community engagement.
For the past several years, local organizations, government entities, advocacy groups, and even philanthropy have made deliberate steps toward increasing community voice and perspective in their policies and programming. CNHED’s Equitable Communities Conference focused on uplifting effective approaches to engaging the communities as well as bringing allies and organizations together to workshop new models for integrating community perspectives and voices.
Equitable Communities 2022 was a marked success, with:
More than 200 attendees
44 speakers and panelists
9 breakout sessions
Over 10 hours of programming
CNHED was honored to welcome Barbara Talley, a motivational speaker, poet, and professional trainer, as the opening keynote for Equitable Communities 2022. Her Keynote, When You Change the Way You Look at things, the Things You Look at Change, offered a powerful message to attendees, challenging them to acknowledge old and outdated leadership paradigms, and discarded them in favor of new more effective tried and true metrics that are less hierarchical, servant leadership oriented, heart-centered, and more inclusive.
Barbara reminded attendees that new attitudes, perspectives, and perceptions are vital for engaging and that recognizing, appreciating, and harnessing the individual power of all community members and forging them into a more unifying and collective whole paves the way for equitable solutions and stronger, more vibrant communities.
During lunch, CNHED welcomed speaker Councilwoman Anita Bonds as well as introduced one of our newest community engagement initiative, the Community Voices Working Group.
Finally, we wrapped up the evening with our annual Community of Leaders Reception, recognizing Councilmember Kenyan McDuffie for outstanding public service advancing racial equity in DC and Leslie Steen as the 2022 CNHED Bob Pohlman Lifetime Achievement in Community Development award winner.
CNHED looks forward to hosting its Equitable Communities Conference again during Community Development Week 2023!