Optimizing Health Equity
Community Building
A public forum of philanthropic and other community leaders from WNC was convened August 20, 2022 to bring together grassroots groups and regional foundations for an inclusive, integrative community-building session. They met as equals, starting from the premise that each of them carries wisdom needed by the other. Bridging this gap sparked fresh strategies, new allies, and more energy to address the social determinants of health using an equity lens.
“We're talking about getting to the real community issues and the conditions that have contributed to inequities. We're not talking about a bandaid. We're talking about getting to the systemic issues and that means being explicit in naming those as we move forward. And the reality is that it takes us interrupting, reimagining, and innovating what these systems are. It requires us to be transformational and not transactional in our work and our relationships with one another.”
— Tracey Greene-Washington, Founder, CoThinkk; President, Indigo Innovation Group
Our Plenary Speaker
Meet Melanie!
Melanie Allen is a founding Co-Director of Hive Fund for Climate and Gender Justice. The Hive Fund is a specialized re-granting intermediary that raises funds and makes grants to groups that have historically lacked access to funding and are addressing the intersecting climate, gender, and racial justice crises in the U.S. with a focus on the South—where both pollution levels and the ability for communities to move us towards transformative action are high and philanthropic funding levels are low. Melanie has raised millions of dollars for nonprofit organizations and political campaigns and is committed to liberating resources as a means of redistributing power and creating a more just society.
“Philanthropy is not some all-knowing entity or sector just because we have resources. We have resources, that is true; if we interrogate where those resources come from, then it is even more incumbent upon us not to be the ones making decisions about where those resources are going. It's more incumbent on us if we understand that, likely, those resources are the result of some form of some kind of extraction from community, then it's even more important to view our role as being facilitators on how community voice helps to guide where resources are going to solve and address these problems. . . . Funders need to show up in ways that demonstrate that they are trust worthy.”
— Melanie Allen, Founder/Co-Director, Hive Fund for Climate and Gender Justice
Grassroots Panel
Highlights from the Grassroots Panel at Optimizing Health Equity 2022.
Funders Panel
Highlights from the Funders Panel at Optimizing Health Equity 2022.
This Forum was sponsored and convened by the WNC Health Equity Coalition (HEC) with the partnership and support of Dogwood Health Trust at the Mission Health/AB Tech Conference Center. HEC’s member organizations collaborate with partners across WNC to ensure vital health services to all its communities, rural and urban. HEC encourages the improvement of health equity by addressing the social determinants of health through use of transformative philanthropic investments.
Watch the Conference
Thank you to all who participated in the planning and success of this event. In the words of Alan McGregor and on behalf of HEC, we invite all to “take ownership of our future” by working together to “make hope and history rhyme.”
