Non-Profit Organizations

Santa Barbara has nearly 800 non-profit organizations, about 20% of which are directly or indirectly concerned with community health, wellness, and vitality. Most of them are in competition for scarce wealth capital in order to survive. This is a dysfunctional 20^th century model that impairs community resilience and needs to be changed. A better model is to encourage collaboration among these non-profit organizations and to reward them for doing so.

Santa Barbara has nearly 800 non-profit organizations, about 20% of which are directly or indirectly concerned with community health, wellness, and vitality. Most of them are in competition for scarce wealth capital in order to survive. This is a dysfunctional 20^th century model that impairs community resilience and needs to be changed. A better model is to encourage collaboration among these non-profit organizations and to reward them for doing so with HSPs. The same logic applies to the foundations themselves. Just as it is in their interest to motivate collaboration among non-profit organizations, they will enhance their own organizational resilience by collaborating under an emerging new model of philanthropic collaboration. If Santa Barbara’s foundations begin to move in this direction, it is further likely their success will attract new sources of philanthropic capital that will be impressed by the positive health, social, and economic outcomes of Santa Barbara’s innovative experiment.

Next: Connecting to Nature