A Places of Belonging program partner in Colorado creates a space for community members to prepare food together, build community and bridge across differences.

Trust in institutions continues to erode across the country. People feel disconnected from government, from the systems meant to serve them — from each other. 

And at the same time, national policy debates are drawing sharper lines around who belongs and who does not through militarized immigration enforcement, the rollback of equity initiatives, and continued legislative efforts to limit the recognition, histories and spaces dedicated to marginalized communities.

These are not abstract debates.

They shape daily life of who feels safe, who is protected, and who is othered. The division and the pressure to retreat into what is familiar, to narrow who belongs, is real. But some civic leaders are making a different choice. They are co-creating, stepping toward each other, working across differences and choosing to build around shared goals — even when the conditions are uncertain.

In Spokane, city council members approved to provide funds to support immigrant families in fear of deportation. A San Diego county equity program awarded first generation college students financial resources amid cuts to federal student grants. Washington State leaders are partnering with Tribal and rural communities to tackle their geographic limitations — lack of broadband, long distance travel, and fewer resources for basic needs. 

And in Colorado, a statewide effort is connecting residents — across racial, political, and generational divides — through art, cooking, storytelling and a startup accelerator.

“These are real expressions of belonging in action,” said Ashley Gallegos, who directs the Othering & Belonging Institute’s Places of Belonging program, an effort that partners with public institutions to dismantle structural inequities and to build systems not only where community voices are heard, but where they directly shape policies and programs.

“At the heart of this work is a belief that belonging can’t be an afterthought,” Gallegos added. “We are building on decades of social change efforts and moving towards a future where belonging is a reality for all, leaving no one outside of the circle of human concern, and where everyone can thrive.”

A cohort of grantees from San Diego, California's Equity Impact Grant Program. The program has become an ecosystem of belonging that creates the conditions for sustained equity work.

An invitation to fight forward

Places of Belonging’s approach to this work aims to turn the OBI frameworks — Belonging Without Othering, Bridging, and Targeted Universalism (TU) — into tangible practice.

More than inclusion, belonging exists as a meaningful voice and the opportunity to participate in shaping the structures that define our lives, said Gallegos. “It is both an outcome and a practice grounded in the idea that everyone deserves to be recognized as a full member of society, calling on practitioners to shift power, center those historically marginalized, and reimagine institutions so they reflect all.”

Within this work, bridging becomes a core practice. Building relationships across differences to foster trust and a sense of shared fate without erasing difference — while Targeted Universalism provides the path forward: A shared goal with targeted strategies to reach it.

Together, they operate as a cohesive whole: belonging names the goal, bridging builds the relationships, and Targeted Universalism charts the path.

Ashley Gallegos presents the "Places of Belonging" program at the 2024 O&B Conference in Oakland, California. Gallegos will lead a Belonging Practice Community cohort this year for practitioners and belonging builders.

Parts of that journey may look different depending on the community. Convening a belonging table for community discourse, funding a mural celebrating LGBTQ+ communities, or rewriting hiring policies to remove barriers and expand opportunity. The work is iterative, Gallegos said, with each partner refining approaches until voices at the margins are not just included, but empowered.

And this practice is taking root across civic institutions: in community organizations, local governments, philanthropic spaces, nonprofits, mission-driven businesses and the networks that connect them.

“Belonging is not something we proclaim, it’s an invitation to fight forward in practice, especially now, when leaders are systematically expanding who is being othered,” said OBI Director john a. powell. “This is the work before us. It lives where people are seen, valued, and able to shape the structures that impact our daily lives.”

john powell meets attendees at the 2024 OBI conference. He will also be a speaker at Gallegos's Belonging Practice Community cohort this year.

Standing your ground when tested

In Spokane, Washington, the city is predominately white and is aiming to be more inclusive and collaborative with its residents. And after the murder of George Floyd in 2020, the Spokane City Council made a decision that would outlast any single political moment: to create a permanent equity and inclusion manager position and write it into city code. 

“We didn’t want it to disappear with political shifts,” City Council President Betsy Wilkerson said. And to her, belonging means taking a stand and making sure people are seen adding that “People want to know where you stand. If you tiptoe around issues, you end up saying nothing.”

Alex Gibilisco, hired for the role, helped introduce the city to OBI’s frameworks of belonging and recognition, which have since become a hallmark of Spokane’s approach. They began inviting cultural groups from different backgrounds to council meetings, where they meet department heads, and are formally recognized on record. Many bring food, said Gibilsco, turning meetings into informal cultural showcases, some performing dances and sharing their lived experiences.

“These groups make Spokane vibrant,” Gibilisco said. “We want them to know they matter, that they belong here, and that their contributions are valued.”

Today, that commitment is being tested against a broader national backdrop.

As federal policies and political leaders increasingly seek to restrict equity-focused initiatives and limit protections for immigrant communities, Spokane has moved in a different direction — expanding its efforts to make belonging tangible in both practice and policy, particularly in how the city defines safety, inclusion, and who its systems are designed to serve. 

In March, Spokane’s city council allocated $100,000 to support immigrant families, directing resources toward community-based organizations providing direct aid. It also codified immigration enforcement-free zones, limiting the city’s role in federal immigration enforcement, and restricted the development of new detention centers — moves intended to ensure that immigrant communities feel safe accessing services and participating fully in civic life.

At the same time, Spokane has worked to embed equity into its broader decision-making structures. An Equity Subcommittee reviews policies through an “equity lens,” shaping outcomes like the renaming of Fort George Wright Drive to Whistalks Way, a name chosen by local tribes — a visible acknowledgment of Native perspectives and history.

When a Pride street mural drew backlash, the city again chose engagement over avoidance and met with both supporters and opponents before passing a resolution against all forms of hate.

“Equity is your workforce of today and tomorrow,” Wilkerson said. “If you want to compete, you have to engage — and you have to recognize the people who make your community what it is.”

For Gibilisco, the real progress is not just in individual decisions, but in what they make possible: “unlikely partners” working together — housing advocates, realtors, and residents with lived experience of homelessness — building trust and shared agency in spaces where division once dominated.

Long-term, Wilkerson and Gibilisco see the city not as the sole driver of this work, but as a convener. Their goal is for community institutions — schools, nonprofits, businesses — to carry it forward so it can endure beyond election cycles.

“The goal,” Gibilisco added, “is a Spokane where everyone feels safe, valued, recognized, and part of the community — and where that commitment is woven into the city’s fabric.”

Alex Gibilisco (bottom right) and Betsy Wilkerson (center) with Spokane city officials and staff during a 2024 training on building belonging in Spokane, Washington.

Seeing themselves in the work

In San Diego County, belonging is not being built in theory. It is being practiced through equity and recognition.

That work began with a public commitment. After declaring racism a public health crisis, county leaders worked with community members to co-create the Office of Equity and Racial Justice (OERJ). From the beginning, the goal was not just to respond to a moment, but to build something that could last, the office’s founding director Andrew Strong said.

“That gave people a sense of buy-in from the start,” said Strong. “Belonging starts when people can see themselves in the work.”

Through trainings, strategy sessions, and thought partnership, OBI introduced county leaders to Belonging Without Othering and Targeted Universalism — concepts that, once learned, became part of their daily vocabulary.

Today, that work continues through the county’s systems: blind recruitment reduces bias, a pronoun policy affirms identity, recruiters engage underrepresented communities directly, and interview questions are shared in advance to support more inclusive hiring for neurodiverse applicants.

“And our leaders are continuing to adapt the work,” said OERJ’s current director Taryell Simmons. “We’re holding onto core principles while adjusting to new conditions.”

Taryell Simmons snaps a selfie with the San Diego Commission on the Status of Women and Girls. In March, the group of local leaders met to emphasize the importance of preserving women’s histories as part of advancing equity work.

San Diego County’s Equity Impact Grant not only funds programs, but builds long-term capacity for community-led equity work. Each selected organization receives $100,000, along with coaching, technical assistance, and support from nonprofit partners. The program earned statewide recognition for innovation, highlighting its impact in strengthening community-based organizations and expanding access to opportunity.

The program stands out because it was co-created with community members and CBOs, centering their voices in the design of solutions that reflect and support the needs of the communities they serve, said Simmons. And at a time when it feels like funding for nonprofits may be tightening, the grant’s impact has been both visible and timely.

First Gen Scholars, a member of the program’s first cohort, used its award to expand support for first-generation college students — momentum that helped secure an additional $1 million from Alliance Healthcare Foundation. Another group, Greater Than Tech, advanced its work by expanding STEM and entrepreneurship pathways into emerging fields such as aerospace, virtual reality, and artificial intelligence, now reaching more than 1,500 underserved youth.

“What has emerged is more than a set of funded projects,” said Simmons. “It’s an ecosystem — one where relatively modest public investments, paired with capacity-building, create the conditions for organizations to scale, collaborate, and sustain equity work far beyond the initial grant.”

But belonging is more than a policy agenda, said Simmons, it’s also a culture shift seen in the recognition and space institutions give their communities.

But what does that look like?

In March, during Women’s History Month, OERJ and the Commission on the Status of Women and Girls hosted a meeting that highlighted student leaders who shared powerful insights from their attendance at the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women and Girls. The meeting also highlighted presentations from the Women’s Museum of California, emphasizing the importance of archiving and preserving women’s histories as part of advancing equity work.

At the County of San Diego Administration Building, the 1619 National Celebration of Black Women “A Stories Quilt” was displayed as more than an exhibit, but a powerful, immersive moment that brought to life the stories of Black women and girls through pieces that reflected resilience, beauty, struggle, and triumph.

“Belonging has to be lived, not just written into a plan,” Simmons said. “When people feel safe, valued, and connected, the systems start to change with them.”

Simmons poses with two organizers of the 1619 National Celebration of Black Women "A Stories Quilt" exhibit.

More than an ideal

In Colorado, the need for connection isn’t abstract — it’s unfolding in real time, across communities navigating division, distance, and rapid change. Belonging Colorado, a statewide initiative powered by a special fund at The Denver Foundation, is stepping into that reality by building something both simple and ambitious: spaces where people can find their way back to each other.

The work is grounded in a clear intention: to bring Coloradans together across lines of difference — race, ethnicity, income, political affiliation, age, and more — and to strengthen not just connection, but a shared sense of belonging. At a moment defined by overlapping social, economic, and environmental pressures, that kind of bridge-building isn’t optional; it’s foundational to the long-term resilience of communities across the state, said Belonging Colorado program lead Erika Montes. “And the need is stark.”

According to the Colorado Belonging Barometer, a survey that measures belonging in the state, only half of residents say they feel a strong sense of belonging where they live, said Montes, “a reminder that the work ahead isn’t about proximity alone, but about reshaping what it means to feel at home.”

Launched in 2024, Belonging Colorado connects Coloradans through funded community projects. With a focus on bridging over bonding, a practice shaped by john a. powell’s guidance, grantees identify shared interests that can bring “unusual suspects” into shared spaces for discourse across differences.

The program has drawn hundreds of community proposals, highlighting demand for tools to address issues from housing to immigration to rural-urban tensions.

So far, 15 projects across the state have tested what belonging looks like on the ground, and even early on, the work is showing what’s possible: young people connecting across differences, leaders shifting how they listen and lead, and communities beginning to imagine a future where everyone belongs.

In Steamboat Springs, community-led housing conversations are being reframed as a shared challenge for families across income levels rather than a zero-sum fight. In Chaffee County, storytelling projects are bridging generational divides. In Eagle County, cooking shared meals is creating unlikely connections across culture and class. And in Denver, collaborative art workshops are celebrating cultural legacies, opening new pathways for understanding and inclusion.

These are intentional, local acts of bridging that are bringing together people who might never otherwise meet to find common ground, said Montes.

Belonging Colorado projects focused on bridging across differences. Local residents pictured here gathered in a meeting room at the Commún Denver community space to make connections and build belonging.

“We want to help people recognize how much they have in common, develop the skills and the will to work across lines of difference,” The Denver Foundation Senior Director of Policy Dr. Janet Lopez added. “People are hungry for this work. They may not know how to bridge divides — but they want to.”

And community leaders have responded, said Montes, learning how to listen differently, hold tension without retreating, and organize around shared goals rather than entrenched positions.

“Belonging isn’t just an ideal, it’s something we can build, one relationship at a time,” said Montes. “Our communities have had a lot of demographic change and fracturing, and through this program we’ve been able to recognize the opportunities to build greater understanding between people of different backgrounds which will lead to greater resiliency in our state.”

At the same time, the work is grounded in a deeper belief — one that extends beyond short-term programs and into sustained commitment. Backed by resources for up to a 10-year investment, the initiative is designed to unfold in phases, allowing communities the time, resources, and trust needed to build something lasting.

And the work is expanding.

This spring, Belonging Colorado is partnering with Startup Colorado to fund a new cohort of company founders exploring how entrepreneurship can become a tool for bridging divides. With a focus on startup ideas, they are merging digital applications and platforms with business ventures rooted not just in scale or profit, but in community and connection.

“Our direction is clear,” said Montes. “In a moment when it is easier to disengage, we are bringing a statewide vision of deeply local practices grounded in the belief that belonging must be built across sectors and by communities themselves in ways that reflect their own realities.”

Youth at a Teens, Inc. created a project for Colorado youth to bridge with each other while doing fun outdoor activities. Here a group prepares to belay a rockwall

Choosing a different path

In Washington State, belonging isn’t being rolled out as a program. It’s being built into the infrastructure of the government itself. Through the Washington State Office of Equity, leaders are quietly reshaping how systems operate, who they center, and how decisions get made — with a clear north star: a Washington for All.

But that vision isn’t soft. It asks something harder — reworking the underlying rules of how power moves. “We are not going back,” said Office of Equity Director Megan Matthews. “Our systems can pit people against each other… But we’re not playing sports. This isn’t a game. We can and must choose a different path.”

That different path is taking shape through interconnected OBI frameworks of belonging and TU, said Matthews, now being put to work across agencies. Matthews was introduced to these practices after hearing john a. powell speak at the state’s first equity summit several years ago. “He described belonging as something that was an ‘our party’ gathering, not a ‘my party with invited guests,’ get together.”

“That distinction matters,” said Matthews. “It’s the difference between inviting people into a system — and building one with them.”

In practice, that means rejecting one-size-fits-all policymaking. And now, the state is setting shared goals, while designing different pathways to reach them. “Western Washington isn’t the same as Eastern Washington; rural areas face different challenges,” Matthews said. “We have to design policies that work for all of them.”

But the work becomes real in how Washington is redefining engagement, said Matthews. Not as feedback. Not as consultation. But as co-creation.

For years, billions in state funding moved through systems many small businesses—especially those owned by Black, brown, women, veteran, and rural entrepreneurs—couldn’t access. Now, through direct engagement, those same communities are helping redesign how access works. Across more than 100 agencies, impact plans are driving this shift, prompting agencies to identify disparities and act—rethinking hiring, simplifying applications, expanding language access, and removing long-standing barriers.

Communities are now co-designing solutions: immigrants and refugees shaping language systems, and tribal and rural leaders building outreach that reflects geographic realities. Participation is no longer extractive — people are compensated, and lived experience is treated as expertise. Supported by equity training and new feedback loops, agencies are refining programs in real time, simplifying grants, broadening access, and using community-informed data to reach those often left out.

And all of this is happening in a moment of real tension.

“We face challenging times,” Matthews said, pointing to a federal landscape that doesn’t always support this work and a tight state budget. “But our commitment to service is clear, and we will not lose sight of our goals. We want people to feel a positive difference because of the work we do and to continue to create a Washington for all.”

Megan Matthews speaks to a packed audtorium at the A. Philip Randolph Institute about the importance of equity work in these uncertain times.

Living into our values

But for Gallegos, the work of belonging is also, in its essence, a democratic value, adding that civic institutions can create space for meaningful input and follow the lead of community-organized engagement efforts, to reflect the needs and dreams of those they serve.

“When we build opportunities for agency, power-sharing, and co-creation, we more fully live into the values and practices necessary to support a healthy living democracy,” she said. “And when we create opportunities for shared decision-making and collaboration. We’re building systems that reflect the communities they serve.”

These efforts are not static, and are evolving in real time.

So, across the country, leaders are adjusting strategies, strengthening partnerships, and finding new ways to stay connected to the communities they serve.

For powell, that adaptability is part of the work itself. Work that needs to be done, consistently.

“Belonging is not a one-time achievement. It is an ongoing practice,” he said. “These are difficult times. We will need to find ways to move together more, not less, despite an environment of targeted fear and division. We must continue not only with care, but with sustenance and strategy.”

Ashley Gallegos co-created an illustration to help practitioners express what belonging without othering is in community spaces. Gallegos will lead a Belonging Practice Community cohort this year. Registration begins May 18. (Illustration by Wenjia Tang) Click here to download the full-size illustration.