Asset-Based Community Development

Why Asset-Based Community Development?

What is asset-based community development? “Building on the skills of local residents, the power of local associations, and the supportive functions of local institutions, asset-based community development draws upon existing community strengths to build stronger, more sustainable communities for the future.”

Asset-based community development (ABCD) is a way of looking at and engaging with the community and neighborhoods around us. In contrast to identifying all of the problems or the things “wrong with” the neighborhood, a person looking at a neighborhood and its people from an asset-based perspective will instead seek the giftedness and abundance in the neighborhood instead of scarcity or lack. The engagement with people will be from a position of learning and relationship and listening and connecting, not a position of judgment or rescuing or doing things “for” people around them. If action is to be taken, it will be in response to the identified interests of the neighbors, as opposed to the creation of a solution to something that has not been identified. Here is a basic example: we might see a seemingly empty or abandoned property that is unmowed and unkept, and our tendency might be to go pick up trash, grab a mower and take care of it. Yet, it will grow back, trash will collect, and we will be inclined to mow it again and again, with no plan or action of how the situation might change.

An alternative could be that we see an unmowed/unkept property, and we begin to ask questions like: who owns the property? What is their intention for it? What do the neighbors on either side of the unkept property think/feel about it? Do they have any dreams or visions for the space? How might we be a catalyst for change in that space? What is needed to there, not just for it to look differently today, but for it to be seen as an asset and a gift in the community?

Why does this matter to us? It matters because we at South Meridian care deeply about the neighborhoods in which we all live and the Avondale Neighborhood in which we worship. The term and practice of “community development” can be interpreted or engaged in from a variety of perspectives. At South Meridian, it means that we want the church and congregation to be a catalyst for healing and renewal in the Avondale neighborhood. It also means we want to be good neighbors, which we see as a two-way relationship; we have much to learn and gain from being in relationship with the neighbors of Avondale, just as we have much to offer.