Opinion: For Colorado nonprofits, being bold must be the new business as usual

After Gov. Jared Polis proclaimed Nov. 1 “Colorado Nonprofit Day” and as nonprofits from across the state convened this year at Connecting Colorado events in Denver, Colorado Springs, Sterling, Greeley, Pueblo, Fort Collins and Grand Junction to advance our work together, we have been giving a lot of thought to how we collaborate to take on some of our most urgent issues in the state. 

As we rebuild from the aftermath of COVID-19, Colorado nonprofits have a chance to dream big for our communities. From housing to arts and culture, we have one of the most robust and engaged nonprofit communities in the country. Colorado is home to more than 23,000 registered charitable nonprofit organizations, with an annual economic impact of more than $40 billion and employing 10% of Colorado’s workforce.

This is our moment to be audacious in our community building. Being audacious doesn’t mean that you fail if you don’t realize your goal. It means prompting our communities to have a strong vision about things like universal access to preschool and improved maternal health. And the consequences of not dreaming big and not working together means we have surrendered to the status quo. 

This approach is not for the faint of heart — the most complex social issues from before the pandemic have grown more intractable. Affordable housing. Homelessness. Immigration. Literacy. Climate change. Access to health care. How we work together across sectors locally and nationally where demand is increasing, and resources are finite, matters more than ever because the work is more challenging than ever.

According to the Colorado Children’s Campaign Kids Count data released this summer, while Colorado’s overall child poverty rate of 15% sits below the national rate of 17%, this is not true for every community. For example, in Costilla County, more than one in every three kids doesn’t have their basic needs met, while Douglas County’s poverty rate is at just 3%.

Child poverty rates by race and ethnicity show we have work to do as a state. Between 2017 and 2021, poverty rates for American Indian or Alaska Native children and Black or African American children in Colorado were triple the rates for white children; the poverty rate for Hispanic or Latino children in our state was more than double.

Also top of mind is mental health, where data indicate youth 18 and younger reporting eight or more days of poor mental health doubled in just six years and emergency room visits for mental health reasons for children is up 140% between 2016 and 2021.

The issues confronting our communities, urban and rural, are changing dramatically. And we know that the solutions will not be found by doing things the way we have always done them. The growing mental health needs among young people, gun violence and poverty inequities in Colorado will not improve by doubling down on stale models of service delivery that don’t inspire innovation and drive social impact. 

How we rebuild matters and if we are going to truly transform our communities in Colorado, we must be collaborative, we need to act with urgency and we need to be relentlessly focused on results. The option to kinda lean into climate and sorta make sure some of our kids can read by the third grade will probably not get us to where we need to be … or where we should be for that matter, given the talent and resources that we have in our state.

As a community, our nonprofits can unabashedly establish bold as the new business as usual with the understanding that we are going to work together to tenaciously and strategically pursue the resources and support we need from the public and private sectors to impact positive change.  

Connecting Colorado events this year brought together more than 780 nonprofit professionals statewide, fostering learning, collaboration and partnerships on relevant topics in each region and across the sector. But what matters most is what comes out of these conversations. The nonprofits that take some of the ideas we broached and put them into action is what will make the greatest difference in our Colorado communities.  

Collaboration coupled with audacity is a powerful remedy to the challenges we face. 

Jamie Van Leeuwen, PhD, MA, MPH, serves as the CEO and founder of the Global Livingston Institute and is a leader and advocate in public policy, community development and social justice in Denver.  

Paul Lhevine, J.D., serves as president and CEO of the Colorado Nonprofit Association where he works at the intersection of social innovation and civic engagement in Denver.