The Collaborative Community is a newly adopted umbrella name for two thriving service organizations. Its intention is to point to the belief that underlies all the activities it harbors now and for the future: that a community working together has great power to develop social capital and repair those aspects of itself which do not serve the well-being of its people.
It began as a secular task force at time when funding for services was being cut and demands for services were escalating rapidly. The members were executive directors of nonprofit agencies and faith leaders who wanted to explore how they could work together to serve Boulder County residents. The taskforce morphed into Restoring the Soul Community Partnerships, a secular nonprofit organization whose primary goal is to encourage and support collaborations between congregations and agencies to provide the volunteers necessary for programs to thrive. In the autumn of 2004 it came to the attention of the Advisory Board that there was an important gap in Boulder County social services, which was assistance to offenders transitioning out of the Boulder County Jail back into society. Members of the board – Bill Grant of Lifebridge Christian Church, Tania Leontov of the Buddhist Coalition, Joan Nagel of Congregation Bonai Shalom and Bill Karelis of the Shambhala Prison Community, as well as several other people dedicated to working in this field, decided to address this issue.
The result was the formation of an interfaith plus program named FOCUS (Facilitating Offenders Seeking Uplifting Situations). The program was conceived of as a secular offender reentry mentoring program which would work with Boulder County Jail inmates.
In October 2004, the program was introduced to Sheriff Joe Pelle. His response was that it filled a crucial gap in the services for prisoners. He signed a Memorandum of Understanding supporting the program. The first FOCUS mentor began work in April 2005. For the first two years only a small number of mentors were trained and in active matches as the program and the jail worked out challenges in protocols and procedures. By 2008 there were over a dozen mentors in the field and clients were graduating from the program.
FOCUS has operated on an infinitesimal budget, with a part-time paid director and volunteers. The oversight boards, professional consultants, mentors and others were all, and remain volunteers. In 2005, FOCUS received a Colorado Compassion Initiative financial award to further its capacity to do this work. It received a modest Wells Fargo award in 2005 and 2008 to provide for emergency needs for inmates on release. The program also received the Community Foundation’s prestigious NOVA Award in 2007 for civic engagement. In 2008 and 2009 the Boulder County Commissioners funded the program.
