Toolbox's Programs
Toolbox has chosen to focus its activities in a few key program areas, based on the priorities identified by the community-based organizations we support.

They are:

Community Toolbox for Children's Environmental Health provides technical support and capacity building grants to community-based organizations throughout the US working on children's environmental health and justice issues. Historically, this support has rested on several main activities:

  • The National Training Workshop (NTW): an annual 2-3 day event that brings together representatives from the grantee groups, provides them with opportunities for relationship-building and networking, and introduces various topics on capacity building;
  • Learning Circles: these self-selected 'learning & working' groups, which are created by grantees at the NTW, hold monthly conference calls and invite guest experts to cover specific themes chosen by the grantees. The Circles also offer the opportunity to continue developing peer relationships and encourage the direct sharing of information;
  • The Grassroots Leadership Network (GLN): a network of community leaders representing current and alumni Toolbox grantee groups that aims to give a national voice to communities facing environmental injustice.

In addition to the NTW, Learning Circles, and GLN, Toolbox carries out a variety of other outreach and support activities. These include site visits, technical assistance grants, tailored support and mentoring on topics such as workplan development, and e-newsletters. Toolbox is also a founding member of the National Disease Clusters Alliance, a group created to assist communities facing a potential disease cluster situation with timely remediation and prevention measures.

Toolbox's Strategy
Toolbox has developed a 3-pronged strategy to enhance our programs' cohesiveness and effectiveness. This strategy posits the following:

  • Emphasizing solutions and alternative approaches to the status quo must be an integral piece in the fight for environmental health;
  • Taking a systematic and measured approach to program development and outreach by giving organizations tools they can use to increase their communities' overall capacity is key to achieving positive, long-lasting change;
  • Promoting peer-to-peer learning taps into the expertise and experience at the grassroots level, thus ensuring that community-appropriate actions and solutions are generated. The impact of these actions and solutions are extended through the building and strengthening of partnerships and collaborative efforts.
Toolbox's strategy thus formalizes certain elements of our approach that highlight the unique niche we occupy among technical assistance providers, namely, the provision of tailored, individualized technical assistance by Toolbox staff and board, and the provision of technical assistance from the grassroots to the grassroots.

Leadership Development & Base-Building
Sustainable organizations and vital programs depend on strong leadership and a strong base. This program area has the following subsets:

  • Leadership Development
  • Community Organizing 101: how to reach out and educate within the community, how to ensure community representation within the organization, how to increase a community's ability to effectively handle environmental issues, etc.
  • Constituency Building: how to develop and maintain an organization's internal capacity (volunteers, members, etc.)
  • Mentoring
Toolbox's support in this area is offered through the Grassroots Leadership Network. Our tailored support includes mentoring not only by staff and Toolbox board members, but also by leaders and members of our grantee groups. We also encourage site visits between our groups and group leaders.

Organizational Development
Based on conversations with our grantee and alumni groups, board of directors, and nonprofit organizational development consultants, we have identified several areas key to a smooth functioning nonprofit. These are:

  • Board Development
  • Finances
  • Fundraising
  • Strategic Planning
  • Technology
We support our grantee groups through the provision of tailored individual assistance, the facilitation of topical Learning Circle calls, the creation and publication of resources and tools on our website and in our e-newsletters, and by holding regional workshops on selected 'hot topics'. We will also develop a set of tools in each area that groups can use according to their needs. These tools -- such as simple Excel spreadsheets for emerging organizations' financial management, an annual workplan format accompanied by periodic check-ins, or a boilerplate board recruitment process -- can be used by groups seeking to prioritize and maximize their limited resources.

Peer Networks
Toolbox supports the sharing of the rich expertise and experience found at the grassroots level through various means. The NTW, monthly Learning Circle calls, and regional gatherings and workshops encourage networking and facilitate the building of relationships and partnerships that will last beyond the Toolbox grant cycle. These relationships increase the effectiveness and broaden the impact of the actions taken at a local level.

The Grassroots Leadership Network builds leadership capacity at the community level, raises the profile of individual groups, promotes the sharing of 'best practices', and creates a solid base of grassroots allies. In addition, Toolbox fosters the development of other 'common cause' peer networks, such as the National Disease Clusters Alliance, as well as participation in state and issue-specific networks already in existence.

The Grassroots Leadership Network is a network uniting grassroots environmental health leaders who either have been or currently are partnering with Community Toolbox. Its aim is to create a collective voice derived from real-life experience, and to thus increase the extent to which policy-makers, mass media, civic leaders, and the general public recognize the expertise held by local community members and include us in decision-making around key environmental health issues. Some of GLN's goals include:

  • Creating a community-based presence within already existing professional children's environmental health networks;
  • Influencing research practices to ensure that 1) affected community members are included in study design formulation and 2) study findings are shared with community members before dissemination to the general population;
  • Influencing policy affecting children's environmental health on local, regional, national, and international levels;
  • Bringing media attention to the children's environmental health hazards faced by local communities and urging the media to seek the voices of local leaders;
  • Educating the general public, particularly parents, about the threats their families may face from toxic pollutants and steps they can take to protect their children; and
  • Mobilizing the general public to act against environmental injustice.
The National Disease Clusters Alliance was formed in October 2005. Composed of community activists, individuals whose children have suffered from cancer, public health workers, epidemiologists, government agency workers, and funding groups, its mission is to create a permanent investigative team at the request of communities facing potential disease clusters, in order to assist the communities with timely remediation and prevention measures. This Alliance is currently developing a set of tools and resources for community use.

Policy, Media, and Research
A comprehensive approach to change also calls for support in the following areas:

  • Policy Research & Development
  • Media Advocacy
  • Community-Based Science
Toolbox collaborates with organizations to provide assistance with effective issue-based education and lobbying, policy research & development, media work, and community-based research (such as supporting "bucket brigades", community surveys, etc.).

In 2004-2005, Community Toolbox received a grant from the Media Action Fund to provide strategic and technical assistance to grassroots groups addressing children's environmental health and justice issues in their communities. We partnered with Gigantic Idea Studio, Campesinos sin Fronteras (Somerton, AZ), Citizens for Safe Water Around Badger (Merrimac, WI), and Health and Environmental Justice Group-St. Louis (St. Louis, MO), to develop local campaigns that have national implications. These ongoing campaigns use a variety of strategies, including radio public service announcements, press releases, Op-Ed pieces, educational "report cards", and "photonovellas".

Campesinos sin Fronteras (CSF) works to educate and protect farmworkers and their families from pesticide exposure. It is also working with local and state policy makers and the Environmental Services Division of the Arizona Department of Agriculture with the goal of limiting the quantity and timing of pesticide spraying. You can download the public education photonovella designed by CSF and Gigantic Idea by clicking here: CSF Novella.pdf.

Citizens for Safe Water Around Badger (CSWAB) is seeking to overturn government policy that currently exempts military facilities from PCB emission standards, and is engaged in a nationwide campaign against open burning that targets the EPA, federal legislators, and the general public. CSWAB will be releasing a report on the impacts of toxins emanating from the neighboring Badger Army Ammunition Plant on Earth Day, April 22, 2006.

Health and Environmental Justice Group (HEJ) is working to eradicate lead from homes, and calling upon city officials to declare lead poisoning a public health emergency. To date, HEJ has held a rally in front of City Hall, and received both TV and radio coverage. To download a Fact Sheet on the St. Louis lead poisoning prevention program, and a Report Card grading the city's performance, click here: HEJ Fact Sheet.pdf, HEJ Report Card.pdf.