Join like-minded champions of green space—urban planners, landscape architects, real estate pros, and our nonprofit coalition partners—for a happy hour that’s helping reshape LA’s future. Plus, enjoy exclusive access to Sage’s bar, craft beer from renowned brewmaster Kim Rice, and delicious food from LA’s first regenerative kitchen. All included with your ticket. 

Learn more and RSVP here.

Join Arts for LA for our annual State of the Arts Summit. This year’s program will focus on the theme of “Legacy” to honor significant arts and culture leaders and challenge participants to think, “What is the legacy that I, personally and professionally, want to leave behind?“

Learn more and RSVP here.

We are already busy getting ready to host our biggest event of the year, Big Give 2023!

On November 19, 2023 we will once again share 1,000 Thanksgiving meal kits with our registered guests, ultimately helping over 4,000 people in our community have the comfort and nourishment of a Thanksgiving meal.

We are proud to welcome the Karsh Center community back for this Thanksgiving meal kit distribution using a “client choice” model, which we used for the first time in 2022, welcoming our registered guests back for an experience in which they will have the opportunity to select their own food items, ultimately choosing a meal that will be most appetizing and accessible for their own families and households.

Learn more and RSVP here.

Prepare our Communities for Disasters, and Recovery

Join Women’s Civic Action Network for Conversation, Crudité and Cocktails With Fellow Los Angeles Civic Leaders

Hear from the foremost experts in Los Angeles how to increase community resilience to disaster.

Please RSVP by 11/3!

Location is at the intersection of Pico and the 405 freeway with complimentary parking on site.

Featuring:

Kristin Crowley, Fire Chief, Los Angeles City Fire Department

Carol Parks, General Manager, Emergency Management Department, City of Los Angeles

Moderated by:

Joanne Nowlin, CEO, American Red Cross, Los Angeles Region

Hosted by the Civicas Board of Directors,

Cynthia Hirschhorn

Laura Fox

Nicole Mutchnik

RSVP here.

Experience the powerful firsthand accounts of formerly unhoused college students and young adults aging out of foster care.

When teens age out of the foster care system, the combined challenges of independent living can be overwhelming. Join us as we explore solutions that allow them to thrive and the transformative impact of community support on their lives.

Hear from housing innovator Sam Prater (founder of Los Angeles Room & Board) and acclaimed author David Ambroz, recognized as an American Champion of Change by President Obama. Guiding us through the evening is the talented actor, producer, director, and activist Shanola Hampton.

Learn more and RSVP here.

Enjoy an Inspiring Afternoon at the 2023 Connections Count Showcase!

Join us at the Connections Count Showcase for an inspiring afternoon - learn how OCLA's WIN app not only connects those who are homeless to essential services but also and works to break the pipeline to homelessness by empowering those who are struggling to find needed support before they fall into homelessness. Connections Count will be held at the Santa Monica Bay Woman's Club, 1210 4th Street, Santa Monica ( or join us via livestream). This year's Showcase will feature live entertainment - including performers from Urban Voices, testimonials from those who have used WIN to help others and opportunities enjoy wine and cheese as you support the raffle and silent auction!

Learn more and RSVP here.

As climate disasters hammer our communities, people are struggling for disaster relief, food, housing, energy, water, and more. In this workshop, disaster resilience expert Caroline Contillo will share case studies of communities that responded to disasters with mutual aid, community care, and collective resource-sharing, leading to grassroots struggles against extraction.

Together, we'll explore questions like: How can meeting our community's basic needs help advance our struggles for liberation? How can we collaborate more strategically, across regions and movements, to build alternative systems and consolidate our power against the fossil fuel industry? 

You will:

• Hear inspiring stories and case studies from BIPOC youth leaders across the U.S. who are organizing for their survival;

• Tune in to your own resilience through somatic / sensory awareness activities;

• And access a toolkit to begin planning climate survival programs in your area.

Learn more and RSVP here.

Join the Center for Public Partnerships and Research (CPPR) and Orange Sparkle Ball for a provocative conversation about the power of community.

Tech-Enabled Community Resilience is a model for harnessing the power of networks in a community ecosystem to influence and change social and health outcomes. This model highlights how co-design principles serve as core equity drivers for technology-enabled community data initiatives. Blending data science with the right technology tools gives communities a platform to pilot rapid innovations, simulate conditions and forecast outcomes, and build strategies to tackle entrenched problems.

This Summit brings together thought-leaders and change-makers in community ecosystems. When faced with opportunity or adversity, community-led efforts start and end with on the ground innovation and inclusion. The power of community is the future face of resilience in a rapidly changing world.

Learn more and RSVP here.

The UCLA Barbra Streisand Center invites you to the inaugural public lecture on the topic of Truth in the Public Sphere

Featuring

André Brock

Frances Haugen

Stuart Stevens

Moderated by

Safiya Noble

Submit a question HERE.

The Barbra Streisand Center was established in 2021 and made possible by the vision and generosity of Barbra Streisand. The Streisand Center will become the future Barbra Streisand Institute at UCLA, a forward-thinking institute dedicated to finding solutions to the most vital social issues.

The Center for Truth in the Public Sphere will be the first area of study and advocacy and will focus on truth in the public sphere, reflecting Streisand's passionate interest in the topic. Speakers and research will delve into urgent and existential threats to democracy, and examine how lies and the proliferation of disinformation can destroy a civic sense of decency, as well as entire countries.

Learn more and RSVP to join in-person or virtually.

Inspiration Meets Empowerment

Join our highly anticipated Women in Green Committee's Annual Breakfast! We're thrilled to announce the return of this incredible event, designed to empower and connect with remarkable women at the forefront of industry transformation.

The Women in Green Breakfast is a cherished annual tradition where we come together to uplift, support, and celebrate women in our industry. This year, our distinguished speakers will take a deep dive into the game-changing Inflation Reduction Act and will unravel how it is reshaping the landscape for women, affordable housing, insurance premiums, and medication costs during our engaging panel discussion.

Fuel your passion, amplify your voice, and be part of a movement that's rewriting the rules.

Learn more and RSVP here.

The Anti-Racist Community Development research project has documented the range of ways that structural racism shows up in community development and the many ways that people are trying to move anti-racist work forward in the sector. Before communities can fully reckon with our past and present and envision a better future, though, we think it’s important to step back and look at some of the fundamental mindsets that shape the sector. The stories we tell about ourselves and about others contribute a lot to how we show up – in our priorities, the ways we spend our limited time and money, our practices, our processes, and our systems.

In “The Stories We Tell Ourselves,” our panel will explore long-standing, hardwired narratives that show up in the community development sector and keep us from doing the racial equity work that so many of us are trying to do. We’ll also look at specific, practical ways that you can creatively push back against those narratives, at the neighborhood level, the city level, or even nationally.

Learn more and RSVP here.