Storyline Community
Milwaukie, Oregon
Storyline is a a Community Collective, helping neighbors know and meet the needs of their own neighborhood. It’s also a Community of Faith and fierce love, rooted in the heartbeat of their neighborhood. They are grounded in the stories of neighbors, children, ancestors, of the ancient Christian faith, and the stories of faithful humanity. They practice embodied love, defiant hope, sacred sorrow, and divine playfulness.
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Milwaukie, OR
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Community Challenges
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Gender Diversity
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Ages
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Neurodiversity
Think Big
Have you ever felt simultaneously urgent and helpless about the things you care about? Have you ever tried to speak out, but felt like your voice was a tiny echo bouncing wildly in the chaos? You are in good company.
Somewhere along the way, many of us forget that we belong to our community and that our community belongs to us.
Something powerful happens when we remember...
When we walk outside our door. When we SEE our neighbors. When we find our people. When we find our voice.
Storyline Community exists as an organization because a group of people made that discovery. When they walked outside their door, it changed everything. They are learning to move closer to the needs of neighbors through community organizing.
Start Local. Be a Village.
The Storyline Community helps empower the youth voices and advocates for transitional housing and rental assistance at the county level. They creatively move closer to the needs of their neighbors and empower others to be part of something bigger than themselves: a community that all can call home.
They partner with Leaven Land and Housing and other local organizers to offer training for those who want to learn how to make real change in their community. Community Organizing can look like small simple actions or giant ripple effects. It is a fantastic way to find your voice in your own community.
What Storyline is Up To
Project Turnkey
Storyline mobilized a base of service providers, local churches, youth, and community members to fight for the Clackamas County Board of Commission to convert a hotel into transitional shelter, using Project Turnkey grant funds. They brought out over 300 neighbors, who learned to tell their story, research, and organize. One county employee was moved to tears by their testimony, saying he had never heard a group of people with more compelling voice.
Faith, Land, Common Good
Through partnership with Leaven Land & Housing, Storyline staff accompanies churches through the process of discernment around their land and resources. These partnerships have resulted in land being opened up to Congolese immigrants to farm cultural foods, buildings transformed into immigrant shelters, new affordable housing being built, and bridging gaps in rent for neighbors in need.
SE PDX Youth Collective
In early 2023, students of their local Youth Collective began to learn the steps of the organizing cycle and followed and participated as the story of Project Turnkey unfolded. They practiced 1-1s and learned more about the surrounding community. The next year, the students turned around and activated these skills when the Wichita Center, a rare resource center for income and Spanish speaking families in Milwaulie that served many of our own students, was facing eviction. They showed up to public meetings, organizer gatherings, and local churches to tell their story. Amid so much public pressure, local elected officials reached an agreement and the Wichita Center was saved!
Storyline meets Sundays at 10am for The Gathering, except the last Sunday of the month which is a sabbath Sunday - a day off to rest and renew. Learn more about the Storyline faith community here! Come as you are.
