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| Tools for Transformation |
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Church and community leaders can receive organizational and leadership training through World Vision’s Tools for Transformation. |
Equipping Communities to Lead with Heart |
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To best serve young people and families, World Vision’s partner churches and organizations in Los Angeles must know what programs and services are available and how to connect them to those in need. That’s where Tools for Transformation comes in. Its training in leadership and network-building equips local leaders with the skills to develop ministries and pull together resources that can make a real, lasting difference in people’s lives.
A recently formed organization of Korean churches had a vision of becoming a unified community development coalition, but limited experience in how to develop leadership and programming. Through a strategic and mutually beneficial partnership, World Vision provided training on how to form a board of directors, followed by successive seminars on how to work effectively and build community development and ministry.
“World Vision’s partnership has enabled us to start our comprehensive training programs for the Korean churches much sooner than expected,” says Hyepin Im, president of the organization. “Consistent with the way World Vision works with organizations, you came in early on in the development of our organization and made the investment to help us grow.”
Tools For Transformation helps not only the churches that benefit from training, but the communities—near and far—served by those congregations. An early sign of success was this coalition’s quick response to the terrorist attack on New York City. The coalition raised more than $85,000 for Koreans and Korean-Americans who lost family members, jobs, and businesses when the World Trade Center was destroyed. The gift was distributed in individual grants through the World Vision American Families Assistance FundSM (AFAF).
“That’s the two-fold benefit that comes from building communities this way,” explains World Vision’s executive director in Los Angeles, Janice Martin. Networking and organizational skills learned from World Vision in Los Angeles helped the AFAFSM assist the Korean-American community on the other side of the country.
Providing Tools for Development
World Vision helps capable churches and church alliances set up the infrastructure needed to deliver services to the communities they serve. Training topics include how to develop boards, attain 501(c) (3) status, set goals, mobilize volunteers, raise funds, build ministries, identify community resources and needs, and design programs. Although training creates capable leaders, World Vision continues to stand by its partners to assist them in accessing the technical assistance, evaluation, and learning tools they need.
World Vision is also partnering with determined pastors and community leaders who are working to create self-sustaining programs that serve the Hispanic population. Hispanic church leadership in Los Angeles and Southern California is tackling diverse issues that range from poverty to education and immigration, thanks in part to capacity-building and organizational training from World Vision. To build strong networks of faith, the initiative is developing leadership through community and economic development training and related seminars.
The initiative also makes good use of donated essentials offered through The Storehouse. Clothing, school supplies, and personal care items are used to build relationships and bridges between communities and churches.
Building Healthy Communities
While leadership training is instrumental in building healthy communities, real community transformation also is spurred through housing loan funds offered by World Vision. This program helps nonprofit developers with pre-construction loans that are critical in funding building projects that provide much-needed low-income and affordable housing.
A $100,000 loan to a nonprofit set up by Westminster Presbyterian Church in Los Angeles will leverage roughly $4.4 million to create affordable housing for 56 senior citizens in the Jefferson Park neighborhood. The Park Place Apartments in Van Nuys, thoroughly remodeled and rejuvenated, is another successful project, thanks to a $100,000 loan to the Foundation for Quality Housing Opportunity. The 140-unit apartment complex is home to mostly low-income families, and since its overhaul, it has become a center of healthy activity (after-school and tutoring programs, English-as-a-second-language classes, and exercise programs) for more than 450 tenants and their neighbors in the surrounding community.
Park Place is a shining example of what vision and strategic partnerships can accomplish. The foundation has borrowed $100,000 from World Vision for pre-construction costs (architect fees, soil tests, environmental reports) on four projects and has repaid those loans, creating a strong loan fund that can continue to serve those who are working to create affordable housing in Los Angeles.
“It’s a great program. These loans give you the money to create the dream,” says Gary Braverman, the foundation’s vice president. So far the foundation he and his father Sy established has leveraged World Vision pre-construction loans into 294 units of low-income and affordable housing for families and seniors.
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