6. Stories & Events, Success Story Exchange

Focus on success and the number of successes will grow. It was in that spirit that IRIS designed and launched the NCW Community Success Summit and the Success Story Exchange with the support of our partners in 2009. The program is designed to showcase examples of innovative stewardship that are creating lasting successes and to connect people and fuel collaboration across the region. We specifically look for stories that contribute to healthy and sustainable communities in one or more of these three ways:

LAND & WATER: Our community maintains diverse, healthy ecosystems

• Increasing health, resiliency, and connectivity of our lands and waters; restoring the natural habitats and species of our region.

• Maintaining environmental quality and beauty while incorporating the needs of people and planning for generations to come.

• Practicing sustainable resource use by reducing waste, maintaining productive farmland, and connecting people with nature via open spaces, natural places, and public parks.

THRIVING LIVES: Our community fosters a high quality of life for all

• Increasing access to transportation, health care, recreation, educational opportunities and safe, decent, affordable neighborhoods where people want to live, work, play, and engage with their community.

• Growing a sense of empowerment, self-reliance, and confidence that supports our ability to adapt and change.

• Fostering healthy businesses that create and retain jobs, increase local production of foods and other goods, and contribute to a resilient economy and environment.

HEART & UNITY: Our community is welcoming and bridges cultural & political divides

• Cultivating cross-generational and multicultural relationships that foster trust and a sense of belonging and produce diverse leaders who step up and seek collaboration.

• Enriching our lives by using art, technology, and gathering places to bring people of different cultures and perspectives together to increase understanding.

• Growing tolerance and creativity through civic dialog that constructively addresses different views, leverages our assets, and builds a common vision.

6.1. North Central Washington Community Success Summit

IRIS began collecting the stories in the Success Story Exchange in conjunction with the first annual NCW Community Success Summit we convened in Pateros in 2009. Ever since that time we have worked with communities ranging from Manson and Bridgeport to Okanogan, Chelan, and Waterville to host the summit because of the energizing effect it has on participants, the way it connects us, offers new perspectives, and reinforces the shared values that make our region strong and resilient.

People come from all over the region to participate in the summit with the number of participants having increased from 45 in Pateros in 2009 to nearly 200 in Quincy in 2016. About half of the attendees come from the host community with the rest coming from the greater region. In Entiat in 2012 we started holding the summit in school gymnasiums which has increased the number of young people involved in planning, presenting, and participating in the one-day event.

View the NCW Community Success Summit printed supplements from 2009-2018

The summit is regarded as a uniquely positive event in the region and one that is increasingly recognized for the partnership and action planning outcomes that it generates. It’s a very “low gloss” affair where we encourage more face-to-face interaction than technology. People do not dress up to come to the Summit but they very much enjoy the opportunity to speak out and share their ideas and hopes with other collaborative people. It is gratifying, each year, to hear how the summit opens participant’s eyes to new places, proven practices, and the cultural and natural context of our communities. It is a practice and program IRIS intends to keep going even as we adapt to post-pandemic needs and norms. See IRIS Focuses on NCW Success.

6.2. Using the Success Story Exchange Collection

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There are times when all any of us need is a little nudge to turn an idea into action, to begin turning the wheel of our own stewardship success cycle. That kind of support – that energy that spurs creativity and strengthens resolve - fills the room at the annual success summit invigorating attendees with a sense of possibility and hope. The event is a spirit lifter powered by the simple act of sharing stories of success, many of which are gathered together in this collection. Stories about this place – from humble to grand - that we individually and communally make happen.

As you browse through this collection and search for specific places or topics, we hope that you will find at least one story that informs and empowers your own work and community collaboration along with some to pass on to others.

6.2.1. Assess the Situation

You can search the Success Story Exchange collection in various ways, depending upon your needs. If, for example you are interested in researching business opportunities in food systems try searching both categories. To find stories you can point to in a capacity-building project proposal you might search the categories community development and collaboration. Search the collection across the themes of land and water, thriving lives, and heart and unity for examples of sustainability.

Take a look at your own work with your family, organization, or community and focus on one thing – large or small – you feel represents a success and a contribution that you helped make happen. We invite you to submit your own story of success that can help someone else succeed. Download the form here and submit directly to IRIS. We will add it to the Success Story Exchange collection and highlight it in the next NCW Community Success Summit.

6.2.2. Convene a Local Success Summit

To tap into the power of Thinking Like a Community and connecting stories to shape our future consider convening your own Community Success Summit. Use each of following activities alone or follow the whole process to assess your community, celebrate what you do well, and plan actions to fill gaps in the story bank. Download the guide to hosting a local success summit.

6.2.3. Conduct a group interview with fellow community members

See suggested questions below and the Gathering Our Voice group interview release form. Listen to an interview with a group from the Pateros Museum recorded in 2018.

• What is one thing about the history of this place that you think is important to pass on as part of the community’s legacy?

• What aspect of your community’s history do you want to learn more about?

• Tell us about some of the practices that fostered self-reliance around food.

• What kind of stories about leadership and inspiring action come to mind when you look back on the history of your community?

• What is something that inspires you about the way your community has responded to critical needs, e.g., fires, floods, illness?

6.2.4. Develop a community timeline

Summarize your community’s history to share with others through a wall chart, video, mural, play or other medium. Get creative! View Creating a Community Timeline to see examples of what other schools and communities have done.

Featured Project

For an example of a student-produced video about their community’s history see Doug Woodrow’s 2013 Yearbook Class project, Okanogan: Small Town, Strong Community

6.2.5. Form a community study group to assess your community

Search and download stories in the Success Story Exchange collection from your own watershed, town, county or other focal area. Convene a group of students, neighbors, or other community members to discuss the stories you find. Consider these questions:

• Was there something about the story that made you want to learn more about it and if so, what was it? Could this success be replicated somewhere else within our region?

• How does the success highlighted in the story contribute to the kind of community we want? How many of the words in the Thinking Like a Community Glossary pertain to your community and how?

• Which stories show how maintaining and restoring healthy ecosystems contribute to a high quality of life? Did you find any stories that demonstrate the linkage between healthy lands and thriving businesses?

• Which stories stand out as good examples of cross-generational learning? How are we incorporating the transfer of knowledge into our organizations and communities?

• Is there one particular story that stands out as a good example of increasing our individual health along with that of the environment?

• What do these stories have to teach us about how to bridge social and political divides and to grow more heart and unity in our communities?

What stories in the collection show us we are creating the kind of community we want? Here are a few examples.

Engaged

Orondo Fire District Chief Jim Oatey reversed the drop in volunteerism associated with changing land ownership and demographics and built a crew of 36 active volunteers including a diverse mix of men and women of different ages.

Prosperous

Increases in wages and benefits have reduced turnover at Wenatchee’s Plaza Super Jet and increased profit. Customers often say what a clean, well-stocked grocery store it is with very courteous employees.

Resilient

The Pateros community has grown stronger, wiser and more resilient following the Carlton Complex Fire. Local partnerships and friendships have flourished as people have helped their neighbors with recovery and preparedness.

Welcoming

Hand-in-Hand organizes a growing number of naturalization services that have allowed hundreds to claim citizenship along with the peace of mind that they can participate in community without fear of deportation.

Caring

When illness or tragedy strikes a farmer during harvest season in Douglas County an informal community care network kicks into gear and neighboring farmers show up to help bring in his or her crop.

Healthy

Each day the Community Cupboard in Leavenworth receives hundreds of pounds of food from the Safeway store that would have been thrown away. This fresh food provides their clients with many more healthy food choices.

Sustainable

Partner organizations worked for years to create a project that provides more reliable water for Methow Valley irrigators, Twisp town planners, and fish on the lower Twisp and Methow rivers.

Cooperative

The Quincy Valley Leadership group works to improve the community by learning about issues, assessing risks, setting common priorities, developing leaders, and growing good relationships with state and county-elected officials.

Diverse

Nature Conservancy’s Stewardship Hunting program in Moses Coulee trades hunting access for volunteer time spent improving wildlife habitat. By 2013 this program had provided more than 1,700 hours of skilled labor.

Learning

Between 80 - 100 students complete WVC’s Hispanic Orchard Education Program each year with over 1,300 workers having been trained since 1993. The program has received industry, state and national awards.

Creative

Middle and high school in Okanogan learn about art and create, sell, and display art throughout their schools, community, and the world because teachers collaborate across curriculum lines such as metal shop and art.

Generous

Since 2009 the Nonprofit Practices Institute has matched knowledgeable experts with hundreds of leaders anxious to improve the organizations they serve, which in turn provide vital services to our communities.

Hopeful

The hard-earned success of the Save the Riverfront Committee in keeping a highway from going in along the Columbia in East Wenatchee fueled the hope that led to the completion of the Apple Capital and Rocky Reach trails.

Search the archive for all of the stories about your county, town or place. See how many highlight these community outcomes and which are missing. If you can’t find a story that illustrates, for example, how welcoming, resilient or diverse your community is look for one and share it with the region via the Success Story Exchange. Download the form. Or challenge your community to create your own glossary. Submit 13, a “baker’s dozen” success stories, one for each aspect of a desirable community, to win a prize at the next NCW Community Success Summit!

Do you enjoy writing and helping people tell their stories? IRIS is looking for people to help edit and format stories people submit to the Success Story Exchange. To volunteer and get more information please contact us at irisncw@gmail.com.

6.2.6. Fill gaps in the Success Story Exchange

Consider what stories you want to submit to the Success Story Exchange – what is missing and what has your community figured out that could help another succeed? Submit one or more stories to IRIS using the Success Story Exchange form.

6.2.7. Develop a community tagline and logo

What is one beautiful thing that can’t be seen by just driving through your community?

If your community were to host the annual NCW Community Success Summit what would your tagline be?

What is unique about your place and what are your aspirations for the future?

See samples below (L-R) Oscar Romero, 2016, Quincy, 2017, Li Ting Hsia, Chelan, and Ruby Germaine, Pateros, 2018.

Featured Story

Waterville: A Great Place to Come Home To

Explore all of the interviews the students did for this project