Many social researchers have commented upon the community damage done by repeated social stigma and unequal treatment. Specifically, they find that the people subjected to that kind of family or society-wide treatment become fearful, anxious, mistrusting and unable to feel safe – even with each other. These researchers and published authors hypothesize that community in-fighting, jockeying for power and constant vigilance have become a way of life for social minorities. Said more simply, this social treatment results in survival skills more suited to individual sports than team sports.

Each of us can see those results in other communities and certainly in our own. However, in the last decade, there are other models and styles emerging; models of partnership and organized and strategic collaboration. It may be the case that HIV/AIDS taught us the power of partnership and team work, or it may simply be that we have come to understand that we are all interdependent.

One powerful example has been the Youth Housing Project. Three years ago – with the leadership and vision of four critical heroes: Dr. Heather Berberet, Rev. Tony Freeman, Deputy Mayor Toni Atkins and Jennifer LeSar – The Center and the Metropolitan Community Church (MCC) began to discuss the issue of homelessness among our youth.

We were quickly joined by community experts and program collaborators, including Cesar Portillo; Laura Mustari, Ken Tyner and the YMCA; Mindy Watrous and Walden Family Services; Rev. Dan Koeshall of MCC; Jan Stankus and SDYCS; and Al Killen-Harvey and Children’s Hospital Chadwick Center. A needs assessment was commissioned and funded with the help of: Benjamin F. Dillingham Community Grants; Benjamin F. Dillingham, III; Brian’s American Eatery; Carol Bittman & Anita Gibbins; Fred Hammond; Gerald Micklos; Glenn Krasinski; Cesar Portillo; the San Diego Human Dignity Foundation; the Imperial Court de San Diego; the Weingart Foundation; James Ziegler and many, many others.

To date, this project has involved literally scores of people, each of whom has played a vital role in launching this project – securing project funds, accessing resources, offering their expertise or helping to provide significant opportunities. From the City Council to the San Diego County Board of Supervisors, including many hard-working city and county staff (including George Biagi and Don Mullen); Pat Getzel and Associates; the incredible staff and board of The San Diego Housing Commission; the Centre City Development Corporation staff and board; the Low Income Investment Fund; the Corporation for Supportive Housing; Dene Oliver; Leslie Wade, Mike Madigan and the East Village Association; to the real estate agents and brokers (many, many thanks to David Yoder, Gail Hillen and Banker’s Hill Properties), even the title company, Alliance Title.

Another more recent example is the “Aging as Ourselves” collaborative. Aging as Ourselves is a new program to provide health and social services to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) seniors in San Diego County.

This innovative, community-based program includes a strong collaboration among San Diego agencies that specialize in senior services and organizations that focus on serving the LGBT community. ElderHelp of San Diego will lead the program in partnership with Family Health Centers; The Center; ElderLaw and Advocacy; Seniors Active in a Gay Environment; and PALS/LINC-age.

Aging as Ourselves is considered a promising model by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), the nation’s largest philanthropy devoted exclusively to health and health care. The $500,000 matching grant for the project was awarded through RWJF’s Local Initiative Funding Partners (LIFP), one of the Foundation’s most highly competitive annual grant making programs. Local funders for the project include the San Diego Human Dignity Foundation, San Diego National Bank, The California Endowment, Alliance Healthcare Foundation, Price Galinson Collaborative Fund and Archstone Foundation.

We seem to have an emerging understanding that it is in our collaborative efforts, within our own community and with our progressive (and sometimes even not so progressive) partners, that we will achieve the quickest and most powerful results. From marriage, to meth, to youth housing and now to seniors, we seem to be acquiring greater and greater sophistication at using a community collaboration model. And those collaborations are clearly bearing fruit.