Joe Erpenbeck

I am enjoying some of the ways to stay connected as the pandemic goes on. Early on, my friend Dave in Cincinnati, hosted a “Music Draft.” About 30 music lovers met online and each selected our top 10 songs of all time. After it was complete we all ...

This colourful pop up plaza has become such a welcoming place in the neighbourhood. These plazas have been set up around the city. At all hours of the day people are there eating, talking, reading, stopping with their pets, playing music, painting and simply r...

Building a Web of Connections I have been hosting a Staying Connected During a Global Pandemic Zoom conversation with old and new friends in North Carolina with support from the North Carolina Council on Developmental Disabilities. At a recent gathering we dis...

A Place for Stories I have been working with several groups including the Free Library of Philadelphia looking at the impact of community catalysts initiatives. The power of residents having a platform to tell their story has been significant. Tiffany, a libra...

This was that last large gathering I was part of before social distancing became the expectation. This was 3 days spent with old friends and meeting new ones, all sharing how people build connections in their neighbourhoods and the significance of this. Now we...

The Power of An Invitation This post comes from Ksenia Stepkina, a very talented community builder who I met at a monthly community conversation that I host. Thanks Ksenia for sharing this story. Back home, we knew all of our neighbours in our apartment buildi...

Last week I found a community place I had not seen before. This skate park, Leeside Skate Park, is next to Hastings Park in an old railroad tunnel. The ramps, quarterpipes, obstacles and graffiti are all amazing.I learned that this skating wonderland was creat...

I was pretty excited to return to my library this week. For now only a few sections would be open, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. After going through these main doors, I saw a line waiting for access to computers but I walked right in to the main floor...

During a recent interview with a group of community builders, one person commented that they always committed at least 30 minutes of their bi-monthly team meetings to talking about the assets that were seeing in their community. These assets were people, group...

People will act, on what they care about. Last night I was reminded of this when I met with the cohort at City Shapers. City Shapers is a civic education program that brings together young community builders from across Metro Vancouver to learn about civic eng...