Organizers say a March gathering brought more than 250 people and 16 organizations together. The next test is whether one-day connections develop into lasting referrals, resident involvement and neighborhood partnerships.
WS Chronicle | Staff Report
Church in the Streets returns to Rupert Bell Recreation Park Friday as organizers try to move the faith-rooted community initiative beyond gathering service providers in one place and toward sustained partnerships with East Winston-Salem residents.
The event is scheduled from 4 to 6:30 p.m. Sept. 11 at Rupert Bell Recreation Park, 1000 Mount Zion Place. The city’s special-event calendar also lists a permit for Church in the Streets-Mount Zion from 2 to 7:30 p.m.
The gathering follows a March 20 event at Rupert Bell that Life of Victory in Christ Ministries Community Development Corporation, or LVCM CDC, says drew more than 250 people and 16 participating organizations.
According to figures published by LVCM, the March event included 50 health screenings, more than 80 food and resource distributions, 40 trauma-informed-care engagements and more than 130 community contacts. The organization also reported that 15 residents signed up for continued involvement.
Those figures are organizer-reported and have not been independently verified by The Chronicle.
They document what happened during the gathering. A harder question is what happened afterward: whether screenings led to medical care, referrals connected residents with longer-term assistance and residents who expressed interest became involved in shaping the initiative.
That question is increasingly central to the model Church in the Streets says it is trying to build.
LVCM describes the March event as part of a “coordination” stage in which organizations come together and establish relationships. The organization says its goal for September is to move toward “cooperation,” including cross-referrals among organizations, shared goals and community planning with East Ward residents.
LVCM has described the 15 residents who signed up in March as potential neighborhood “co-designers,” meaning residents would have a role in developing the work rather than participating only as recipients of services.
How much authority residents will have in that process — and how their ideas will change programs or spending decisions — remains an important measure of whether that approach develops as planned.
The initiative builds on a model The Chronicle first reported on in March 2025, when Church in the Streets was preparing a kickoff at Fairview Park.
At the time, LVCM President the Rev. Kenneth Holly described an effort to bring churches, neighborhood organizations, nonprofits, businesses and local institutions together rather than have organizations work separately or compete for the same resources and community attention.
The initiative has identified housing, education, youth development, workforce development, health and wellness and economic stability among its areas of focus.
Its underlying premise is that churches may have trusted relationships in neighborhoods that larger institutions sometimes struggle to reach, while congregations generally do not have the expertise or resources to address every housing, health, employment or family need on their own.
That makes effective referral systems important.
For a resident seeking help, collaboration means more than having multiple organizations represented at the same event. It requires organizations to know where to send residents, understand one another’s eligibility requirements and, when possible, determine whether people actually received the services they needed.
LVCM says that kind of cooperation is the next stage of its work.
Its longer-term framework calls for moving from coordination to cooperation and eventually to what the organization describes as full collaboration — programs co-designed, financed and delivered across organizations and communities.
LVCM says that final stage is a goal for 2027 and beyond.
Friday’s event offers an opportunity to begin measuring that progression.
The organization has published participation and service numbers from March. Future reporting will depend increasingly on what happened after those initial contacts: how many referrals were completed, how many residents stayed involved and whether partnerships formed at community events translate into lasting services and neighborhood decision-making.
The city calendar also lists additional Church in the Streets events Sept. 18 at a Fifth Street location and Sept. 25 at an Eleventh Street location.