Supporting sustainable community work through co-creation
Jennifer Gastelum, Manager, Strategic Learning, Explore Program and Johanna Richards, Program Manager, ASU @ Mesa City Center
Background
Downtown Mesa has seen substantial development, including from ASU, which contributes to gentrification and displacement specifically in West Mesa’s Latinx communities. A long history of disinvestment and lack of representation requires strategies to strengthen community resilience and ensure communities participate in designing the future of their city.
Question
Do community led and community organized events lead to strengthened community cohesion and identity, and ultimately resilience?
Methods and Findings
In our culture, efficiency and individual results are prized, sometimes overshadowing co-creation. Instead of launching our own market, we backed Mercado Mesa, a community-driven night market initiative.
We identified five elements of co-creation as a strategy for supporting sustainable community work:
1. Not starting with the end in mind.
2. Look to the community as leaders in the work.
3. Flexibility led by responsiveness.
4. Trust as a central factor.
5. Getting your hands dirty is necessary.
Deliverables
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Collaborated with Mercado Mesa aiming for a self-sustaining market beyond a single leader or funding cycle.
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Co-created reusable market furniture with ASU MIX Center.
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Recruited marketing staff.
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Designed promotional tools like totes, posters, and vendor books in collaboration with SATURNHEX
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Developed workshops for additional Southside Mesa vendors and one-on-one technical support to help vendors get necessary licensing (in partnership with RAIL CDC)
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Developed a handbook that can be used to document processes and tools (in partnership with Mercado Mesa Leadership)
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Overall support to Mercado Mesa Sept. - Dec. 2023
Jennifer Gastelum and Johanna Richards
Community Fellows, 2023
Jennifer’s degrees in Psychology and Community Counseling serve her well in her role as Community Engagement Specialist at Mesa Arts Center. Previously, Jennifer worked at Neighborhood Economic Development Corporation (NEDCO) researching and exploring the effective use of art as a community and economic development tool in Downtown Mesa and on Apache Boulevard in Tempe.
For the past six years, Jennifer has worked with other community partners to implement programs such as Mesa Up @ Nite, the Ripple Grant Program, Apache Eats Restaurant Crawl, Easy Like Saturday Morning and Mimosas & Palomas Art Brunches, the Well Fed Artist Workshop Series, the CC Gallery Project, Wordplay Café, Hack the MAC, and, most recently, The Collective Creative Leadership program. Each month, Jennifer leads a monthly committee of community members to make decisions about existing programming and to work together to identify and implement new programming opportunities that will have the biggest impact on the surrounding neighbors and businesses. Jennifer has served as coordinator for the Mesa Prototyping Project, and has acted as curator and coordinator for the Spark at Dark third Saturday event at Mesa Arts Center.
She is an advocate for community-based practice and using art as a tool for economic and community connection, spreading this message by serving on panels, presenting at conferences, and co-hosting a monthly podcast about creative origin stories. As a local resident and a Mesa native, Jennifer is driven by her passion for community and the arts, and the value of bringing the two together to make positive change.
Johanna Richards is the Community Engagement Program Manager for the Media and Immersive eXperience (MIX) Center for ASU @ Mesa City Center. She works to connect the people, institutions, and organizations of Mesa communities with the MIX Center and to ground the MIX Center in the Mesa community.
Johanna was a reluctant Arizona resident now rooted in Mesa. A six-month Asset-Based Community Development project in 2015 introduced her to people who care deeply about the place they live, working to see it flourish. They welcomed her into the various histories and communities of Mesa. She is heavily involved in the arts and development community of downtown Mesa and the Broadway Corridor.
Her 18+ years of social service and community engagement experience includes work in Missouri, Kyrgyzstan, and Arizona. She has worked with parents navigating the child welfare system, helped families strengthen their support networks, developed community health education programs with at-risk women, and co-run a neighborhood community center. She currently serves on the City of Mesa Housing and Community Development Advisory Board, the RAIL Community Development Corporation Board, at Paz de Cristo, and as part of Missio Dei Communities Mesa. She formerly served on the Mesa Arts Center’s Creative Catalyst Committee and as a lead project artist for the Mesa Prototyping Project.