Uncompahgre Valley Alliance in Montrose County has seen unprecedented growth and focus as plans set in motion over a year ago continue to fall into place.

In November, our Alliance offered a community organizing training, and began a campaign-planning process that will drive our Alliance’s efforts in 2024.

All we accomplished in the final quarter was defined by one event, our Community Conversation that took place on Thursday, December 7. Dozens of hours went into planning and preparation to bring this group of people together.

If you weren’t there, I’ll quickly summarize: It was spectacular!

This was the largest in-person gathering our Alliance has had in the past four years. Fifty-three people showed up and made this our dream event. We gathered to connect with old and new friends, to hear about the organizing process our Alliance’s leadership has carried out, and to be in conversation with our neighbors who also want a healthy, just, and self-reliant Montrose. Folks discussed the lack of affordable housing and inadequate public transportation. These were two problem areas we heard about in our deep listening work and felt could serve as the first campaign following the Uncompahgre Valley Alliance revitalization effort.

We carried our research actions and combined that with the input community members provided in the Community Conversation. With these two ingredients, the committee felt confident moving forward with one of the aforementioned problems. A new year was ushered in and since then we have been lining up all the important pieces to bring this campaign to Montrose. Our official announcement is imminent, thank you for your support and patience.

We are very encouraged by the planning process so far and cannot wait to bring it to life!