NewStories

Over decades of accompanying communities through disruption and transformation, we have come to believe something deeply: trust is the infrastructure for regenerative futures to emerge. Durable relationships create the conditions that make lasting transformation possible—and investment in those relationships is core to everything we have seen succeed.

That conviction brought us to this resource, and we think it will resonate with many of you.

Community As Strategy: 10 Ways to Create Belonging and Power Where You Live is a beautifully crafted, freely shareable zine by Sarah van Gelder—lifelong activist, writer, and founding editor of YES! Magazine, and a longtime friend and colleague of NewStories and Great Transition Stories founders Bob Stilger and Lynnaea Lumbard.

Sarah's ten practices are rooted in lived experience, cross-cultural wisdom, and decades of on-the-ground learning. They are for anyone who gathers people: neighborhood organizers, facilitators, educators, community builders, team leaders, and anyone trying to make the groups they're part of work smoother.

"It was community that kept our ancestors alive. And it will be in community that we can support each other through today's crises." — Sarah van Gelder

The zine is free—in the Creative Commons—to download, print, copy, and share widely. Thirty pages of practical wisdom you can hold in your hands, pass across a table, or drop into a group chat.

Read our overview and link to download via the link in comments.

Restoring fire-affected landscapes takes more than good intentions. It takes data, trust, flexible funding—and sometimes, 30+ partners willing to work together across jurisdictions over generations.

Last week, the Regenerative Responders community gathered to learn from Taylor Nilsson, Executive Director of the Butte County Fire Safe Council, about the collaborative model powering landscape-scale restoration in Butte County, California.

A few things that stayed with us:
🌿 Look for "stacked benefits"—the ways a single project can serve multiple partners at once. When shared value becomes visible, trust and momentum follow.

📊 Accurate shared data is foundational. Without it, project planning and grant development stall before they begin.

🤝 Trust takes time. The atmosphere of collaboration within the Butte County Collaborative Group has been built over years of steady relationship-tending — and it's what makes everything else possible.

💰 And the biggest challenge? Funding. Landscape-scale restoration requires 100-year thinking. Our funding models haven't caught up yet.
The full recap and recording are available now—with lessons that translate to communities navigating recovery and regeneration anywhere in the world.

Read the full reflection and watch the recording via the link in comments.

Seven years ago, the people of Paradise, California, faced the unimaginable. What they have built since is something the world needs to see, and is best told by the people who lived it—who stayed, returned, and chose to build something worthy of what was lost.

NewStories has been accompanying the Paradise community since early 2019. And now, we're inviting communities from everywhere to learn alongside them through two upcoming events—open to anyone, anywhere doing this work:

🌱 April 30 — Regenerative Responders Community Call (online—join from anywhere) Collaborative Funding Strategies in Paradise, Butte County & Beyond
Community leaders from Butte County share tested strategies for coordinating resources across 30+ partners—hard-won lessons that translate to communities navigating recovery and regeneration anywhere in the world.

🏔️ May 14–15 — NorCal Fire-Affected Communities Collaboratory Learning Exchange (in Paradise, CA)
An on-the-ground gathering open to communities everywhere—a rare opportunity to learn directly from the practitioners living this work, in the place where it is happening.

These are invitations into what becomes possible on the other side of loss—and the people of Paradise are living proof. The learning they are willing to share belongs to all of us.

Link to read more in our newsletter (and to register) in the comments.