In 2010, a prominent service agency on Seattle’s Eastside region, Hopelink, led an effort to understand how to locate and harness the massive volunteer energies that existed in the region’s communities. They researched community awareness of, and attitudes towards basic human needs issues that existed in their local communities.

Their results led to the formation of an independent task force who began to develop an intriguing model of volunteer coordination and engagement that they eventually called the Nourishing Networks Model. That group went on to form their own separate 501(c)(3) non-profit team now known as The Nourishing Networks Consortium.

The First Nourishing Networks Local Group Meeting - After learning the extent of a food insecurity issue among children in a local Kirkland area elementary school, the NNC team convened the first Kirkland Nourishing Networks local group meeting. They began by inviting various local service agencies, including Hopelink, as well as the neighboring faith communities, neighborhood associations, government agencies, and passionate volunteers, as well as the local elementary school principal and school counselor.

That first meeting was magical. There was the initial realization that this gathering of people representing their various groups had never met like this before, in this comfortable and welcoming meeting environment, and were thrilled to do so. They were there as community volunteers who brought their own resources, talents and skills to the table to address a community issue that none of them separately had directly known to address before. Then, as the meeting went on, they all developed a profound sense of ownership of resolving the issues that had been identified clearly by the school officials.

From this non-hierarchical, grass roots, bottom up perspective, they created their own agenda, people began to take on various roles as they were comfortable doing; a person took on the role of a project coordinator and soon was putting together an idea that could help these school kids get the help their families needed. Someone had resources they could donate, someone had a storage facility, another had a truck, someone could donate backpacks, others could meet and pack food into them. Others moderated the meeting, others were great connectors who knew other resources, and were great communicators and meeting conveners. And it all came together, they helped their local school children and the school get the help they absolutely needed. And what was also discovered was that - it worked! And they all wanted to do it again!

Similar groups were started in nearby metropolitan areas and the newly formed Nourishing Networks local groups in nearby Redmond and Bellevue showed similar results, bringing together hundreds of people, volunteers from diverse sectors and cultures sharing their ideas, experience, resources, as well as their existing networks to help leverage the energies of the community in new and profound ways. Connecting people who want to help people directly with those who need help - in ways never before possible.

Nourishing Networks local groups are currently located in Bellevue, Issaquah/Sammamish, Renton/Kent, Kirkland, Redmond, Bothell/Kenmore/Woodinville, Bremerton, and Shoreline. After the pandemic hit in 2020, the NNC decided to increase it’s vision; to replicate the model of what a Nourishing Networks group is, and how it works, in every community throughout the country, network them all together unleashing the full power of passionate volunteers, service agencies, neighborhood associations, faith communities, government organizations, and resource providers across the country, increasing their impact and efficiencies wherever they are located, weaving the fabric of all of our communities closer together than ever before.