Civic Passage Foundation

Civic Passage Foundation strengthens the connection between underserved communities and the services, organizations, and resources that already exist to support them. Through community organizing, relationship-building, systems navigation, and grassroots volunteer leadership, we work to identify where pathways to help break down and build the community infrastructure needed to close those gaps. Our goal is not simply to create more services, but to make existing systems more accessible, connected, and responsive while cultivating greater community participation and leadership.

Civic Passage Foundation is a founding-stage community-action organization focused on strengthening the pathways between underserved and vulnerable communities and the services, organizations, and public resources that already exist to support them. We begin from the belief that communities often do not lack resources entirely; instead, people may struggle to discover, access, navigate, or remain connected to those resources.

Our approach combines community organizing, relationship-building, systems navigation, and grassroots volunteer leadership. Through the GoodNeighbor Community Action Model, we first identify a community and map the organizations already serving it, then listen to community members and providers to understand where access or referral pathways break down. From there, we seek to build small, community-informed interfaces that close specific gaps without unnecessarily duplicating existing services.

Our work is guided by four core values: Compassion, Dignity, Community, and Agility. We believe people should be treated as active participants in their communities rather than simply recipients of assistance, and that sustainable community action depends on relationships, shared ownership, and opportunities for volunteers and community members to grow into leadership.

Civic Passage is beginning with a discovery initiative focused on adults experiencing unsheltered homelessness in Venice, California. Our current work centers on understanding the local service ecosystem, listening to people with lived and professional experience, identifying where pathways between need and assistance fail, and determining what kind of community-built infrastructure could meaningfully improve access and continuity.

As we grow, we aim to develop a flexible, locally responsive network capable of helping communities connect people to resources, strengthen collaboration among organizations, and cultivate greater community participation and leadership.