(Jan. 31, 2018) Catherine Read interviews Stacey Picard, founder and director of The Urban Stories Project. The genesis of this organization focused on storytelling began five years ago when Stacey relocated to Northern Virginia from Cleveland, Ohio, and began volunteering. Tutoring first graders in math at the local elementary school during the week and serving lunch on weekends through SOME got her thinking about what happens to six year olds that some of them end up homeless. “Nobody wakes up and says, I think I’ll be homeless and stay under a bridge and this is the path I’ll take,” says Stacey.
A friend suggested she look into the work being done by Theatre Lab in Washington, DC. She cold called Deb Gottesman and got involved in their Life Stories Program. This program works with marginalized communities – AIDS patients, wounded warriors and homeless women in addiction – to create artistic pieces from their life stories that can be performed or made into a film. Involvement in the Life Stories Program brought her to N Street Village where she met Tom Workman who had been doing this type of storytelling with the women there for a decade.
When Theatre Lab created the Life Stories Institute in order to train instructors in teaching storytelling, Stacey went through the program. When Tom Workman left N Street Village to work on another project, she stepped in to continue his work there. She’s been running the program for three years now in addition to working with other organizations. Her interest goes beyond creating performance pieces to creating published works of personal stories. Years ago, she worked with a group of middle school girls in Cleveland to produce a book of poetry and photos that helped the girls to better tell their stories. Currently, she is working with students at a high school in Southeast DC. The storytelling work there includes helping the students to access their personal stories for their own understanding, and then to craft those narratives into essays for college admission and scholarship applications.
She is currently working with Shout Mouse Press, a writing program and independent publisher founded by Kathy Crutcher. This opens up the possibility of creating enduring works of storytelling by collecting and publishing collections of stories. Stacey has been working with Friends of Guest House, a re-entry program for formerly incarcerated women, to help the women to tell their stories in ways that help them in their efforts to rejoin their families and communities. The women have to face potential employers with an explanation of how they made a poor decision and ended up with a felony record. They are also asked to speak in front of groups to tell their stories and in front of legislative committees who are considering policies that impact them and women like them. Stacey hopes to collect and publish a book based on the experiences of the women who have come through the Friends of Guest House program.
Stacey talks about the tribalism we are currently experiencing in this country and how technology and social media creates bubbles that isolate us into closed networks of like minded individuals. She observes that this leads us to stop seeing the humanity in other people. Storytelling is way to bring people together in a more genuine and authentic way. Helping people to tell their stories is not about agendas or creating spin. It’s about creating a safe space for someone to share their story, to trust themselves to access their own story and to feel “This matters. I matter. I own this and it deserves to be told.” Too often, the stories of marginalized people have been drown out. She often asks her students to consider: “What would the world be like if you didn’t exist.”
It’s also important for organizations to be able to tell their stories. Most non-profits and direct service agencies don’t have a line item in their budget for the professional development related to telling compelling stories about their mission. The clients they serve often don’t have the support and assistance to tell their stories on behalf of the organizations that changed their lives. And the staff who work in non-profit organizations are not necessarily equipped as storytellers either, creating missed opportunities to genuinely connect with clients, volunteers, collaborating partners, donors and the media. Stacey believes that Board and Staff Retreats are an excellent forum for introducing these concepts and she hopes to do more organizational work through The Urban Stories Project.
To learn more about The Urban Stories Project, you can follow them on Facebook and also on Twitter @UrbanStories17
Kyle has been active in Fairfax County politics and policy, having worked as a top aid for Supervisor Pat Herrity and serving on local boards and commissions in the Fairfax County. He lives a life of service, having done mission work in Haiti through his church, and serving on local Rotary and Lions Clubs at home in West Springfield. His disdain for the President was evident, as he has felt like the GOP has lost its moral compass. He also believes that the current crop of GOP leaders is abandoning the core guiding values of conservative philosophy, which promotes smaller government. Kyle continues to see himself as a true conservative, and plans to stick to his principles as he moves forward with new endeavors as an Independent.
When asked about the future of the Republican Party, McDaniel asserts that until the party can become more inclusive, and realign itself to understanding the needs of the next generation, then the party will continue to shrink. He also feels that the 
No Child Goes Hungry has issued grants to groups in 9 states, Washington, DC and Honduras. Rev. Rasmussen emphasized that the only requirement that is needed when applying for a grant is a good idea. She shared a story about a young high school student name Maddie Harris who wanted to build a food pantry at her high school, but lacked the supplies such as airtight plastic containers that were needed to complete the project. The young lady applied for a grant with NCGH, the project was completed, and they are now operating a food pantry at her high school supplied by donations from participating families.
Over the past one and a half years since 
The Anglican and Episcopal Churches came together 20 years ago to 
model also helps to build resiliency in impoverished communities. Stanton-Hoyle recounted a story about a lending group that worked in South Sudan, one of the poorest countries in the world. As civil war erupted, and citizens were displaced to refugee camps, the graduates of the Five Talents program took their lending circle skills with them. These mentors helped refugees understand their assets and talents, which enabled them to organize and start small enterprises for basic services like babysitting, tailoring, shoe repair, etc. The education that the mentors received from Five Talents is something that they took with them, and in turn enabled them to improve their own lives and the lives of those in their communities.
The memorial designed includes 19 interactive stations where visitors can learn about the suffragists, and their historic movement that brought about the 19th Amendment to the Constitution. The movement consisted of approximately 5 million women, and the memorial aims to cover all of the different constituencies who played a part, including African American and Jewish women who were instrumental in moving the issue forward. The memorial will cost approximately $2 million, and Wirth shared that they aim to have it constructed by August of 2020, the 100th year anniversary of the 19th Amendment. She notes that the organization recently received a $25,000 grant from Dominion Energy and have had some successful fundraisers, but have a long way to go to reach the $2 million goal. If you are interested in supporting these efforts you can visit the website to make a 
In Northern Virginia, the biggest news was that Prince William County’s House seats flipped in a wave of blue that ousted a number of incumbents:
Ben discusses how the huge voter turnout impacted this election and why so many GOP incumbents could not survive the wave. The idea that this election could flip control of the House to the Democratic Party was not something for which the party leadership had prepared. There are also steep learning curves for the new Delegates heading into their first legislative session. The fact that the Speaker of the House, Kirk Cox, makes assignments for committees in both chambers means that every committee will CONTINUE to have a majority of Republican members. While there was a negotiation for “proportional representation” on the committees, the very early days of session have dramatized how little difference that makes when committees vote along “party lines.”
Activists in Virginia were ready to get to work after the devastating loss in November of 2016 that gave Donald Trump and Republicans complete control of the Federal government. Grassroots organizers came together in unprecedented numbers to help turn the tide in the commonwealth. Spawning groups like 
Finally, when asked about Medicaid expansion Simon felt very positive. As a signature issue of outgoing Governor Terry McAuliffe, as well as a campaign promise of incoming Governor Dr. Ralph Northam, Simon believes that there will be a real opportunity to deliver healthcare to hundreds of thousands of Virginians. With hard work and compromise between the two parties, Del. Simon thinks that they will come to a “yes” in order to take advantage of the 6 million dollars a day that the commonwealth is giving up by not accepting the federal Medicaid expansion program.
The advocacy committee, notes Khurama, has a mission to support public policy initiatives that have three main objectives. First, they want to expand access to menstrual products in schools, women’s shelters and correctional facilities. Second, they aim to make menstrual products more affordable by making them tax-free or allowing the products to be included in Flexible Spending Accounts (FSA) Benefits, and by adding eligibility of these items for refundable tax credits. Lastly, they aim to make the products safer by requiring manufacturers to list the materials used in the products.
In an effort to educate girls about this issue, Seibold shares that BRAWS has started a teen leadership council, where girls from Elementary, Middle and High Schools come together and learn how to talk openly about periods. They are then ambassadors, as they return to their home schools and hold conversations about periods with their peers. BRAWS aims to educate the next generation and take away the stigma about periods, using proper terminology, as well as having free products available in bathrooms and clinics at schools. BRAWS has heard from girls who have had to leave school because they get their period and don’t have access to products to manage their menstruation. This is something that can and should be addressed.