Archives for March 2026

Coming from a very large family it has always required a pretty broad ‘tent’ to cover us all. We are different in terms of place of birth, the language spoken at home, political views, religious and spiritual practices, education, gender, sexual orientation, marriage, kids/no kids, and on and on. We are a diverse family by every common definition, different in a hundred different ways, and yet we are connected in ways that cannot be broken. Or at least we always hope that is the case.  

In order to stay connected to each other – in families and communities – it takes more than proximity and friendliness. It takes intention and purposeful engagement with each other, fighting against forces that want to separate us from each other and want us to fear what someone else might take away from us. I realize that connection, community, and belonging are constant messages that North Sound ACH sends to you, but this is our work. 

It would be easier to just pause in our tracks and wait until this crisis (or the next one) passes. But part of our reason for being is to not sit on the sidelines, but to ask ‘how can we be of help?’ to our colleagues and partners and friends. 

North Sound ACH is part of a growing table of organizations committed to Washington being a state where everyone feels that they belong. A few weeks back I was asked what that would look like to me. I said I wanted this state to be a place that my grandson would choose to live over all the other possible places, because he sees an opportunity here that he can’t see anywhere else – to thrive in every sense of the word. It is about more than finding a good paying job; it is about safety, being seen and appreciated, welcome and celebrated – being part of a collective whole. 

Imagine a place where we look out for each other (which means others are looking out for you.) We can be a community, a region, a state that thinks about the impact on those least able to withstand the pressures of 2026, and even while facing substantial changes because of budget pressures, we assure that no one is going to be left standing alone. 

This is no longer aspirational; it is critically necessary. In order for any of us to thrive we must find paths for everyone to thrive.  That is the work ahead of us and none of us can do this alone. 

Thank you for all you do – 

Liz 

PS – If you did not get a chance to see the last blog post, written after the February Convening, you can find it here.

Last week, the North Sound Partner Convening was focused on food insecurity – the first time that we have had a single topic convening. The room was filled with folks passionate about the topic, who know what is needed in their organizations and for the people they serve.  

We ended the day with a question – I think of it as ‘how should we spend the next dollar?’ Since 2023, the ACH Board has approved discretionary spending each year allowing North Sound ACH to award grants to partners working around the Vital Conditions for Well-being. More than 80 projects have been funded across the region to seed innovative ideas, even though the ACH does not have funds to sustain the work. That is the reason we focus on capacity building: working in partnership with other organizations, and seeing what other resources may be available to continue the work. Leverage is a key theme – how we can grow resources through our investments.

We are not the same as a community foundation, but we can use ACH resources to jump start innovation and support capacity. 

We ended the convening by asking attendees to share ideas of how we should set the criteria for the funds available in 2026. The requirements already include that applicants are:

• Members of the Collaborative Action Network,
• In collaboration with at least one other Network partner,
• Connected to at least one of the Vital Conditions,
• Agree to reporting and site visit requirements.

Last year we had close to $4 million to distribute and received nearly $12 million in requests. We anticipate that this year will show even more need than we have funds to support. It takes us back to leverage. How can we work together to bring more resources to this important work?

Report outs from the table discussions were rich – and sometimes contradictory – reflecting how hard it is to say no to any request when we know the need is vast. The ACH team is still compiling all of the notes, but here are few things I heard as recommendations:

• Simpler applications, with some ability to submit in alternative formats, such as video
• Don’t require outcomes to be listed; yet you want the dollars to go where they will have the greatest impact
• Don’t require applicants to compete with each other (i.e., share the dollars equally to all applicants); yet there were recommendations to put dollars where there is the greatest need, and in communities facing the highest disparities
• Support what is currently in place (replacing lost funding); yet support new ideas and partnerships
• …and more – 20+ tables reported their ideas and we’ll look at them all. 

We will prioritize proposals that address food insecurity, and accept proposals aimed at other Vital Conditions focus areas. We hope to have the applications posted on our website the first week of April, and that will be a heavy push to make that happen – stay tuned. 

We live in times of contradiction and inconsistency and that can be exhausting. The sun has come out, daylight hours are growing which means plants are starting to bud. And people in communities are still being stopped and detained, and bombs are dropping again, folks are in need and looking to us to help. It asks a lot of us and people in our communities. 

We are grateful to you all, your families and teams. Thank you for all you do and we hope to see you all again soon.