Beloved Communities Network Awarded $500,000 Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Grant for Oakland Horizon Story Project
Two-year investment will support a community-led initiative advancing intergenerational health equity, storytelling, civic imagination, and coordinated action in Oakland
OAKLAND, CA – April 29, 2026 – Beloved Communities Network (BCN) is honored to announce that it has been awarded a $500,000, two-year grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation through its Exploring Equitable Futures initiative in support of the Oakland Horizon Story Project.
This investment marks a major milestone for BCN and an important moment for the future-building work taking place in Oakland.
The Oakland Horizon Story Project is rooted in a simple but powerful belief: communities should have a meaningful role in shaping the systems that shape their lives. At a time when many Oakland residents are navigating displacement, inequality, fragmentation, and uncertainty, the project seeks to harness the tremendous wisdom, creativity, resilience, and possibility already present across the city. The Oakland Horizon Story Project was created to help turn that possibility into coordinated action.
This project is rooted in the belief that Oakland residents should help shape the systems that shape their lives. We’re honored to have support that allows us to invest in the city’s imagination, wisdom, and future.
– Leila McCabe, Founder, Beloved Communities Network
Rooted in Visionary Community Practice
The Oakland Horizon Story Project builds upon the visionary work of Norma Wong and Collective Acceleration, whose long-standing leadership has helped communities imagine beyond crisis and move toward coordinated pathways for healing, belonging, and transformation.
A core inspiration for the project is the practice of Horizon Story Circles – facilitated community spaces where residents reflect together on lived experience, historical memory, present conditions, and shared possibilities for the future. These circles help surface collective wisdom, deepen connection, and generate narratives that can inform practical action.
What Is the Oakland Horizon Story Project?
The Oakland Horizon Story Project is a community-led, long-arc initiative designed to translate shared vision into coordinated strategy for intergenerational health equity.
The project centers Oakland residents as co-authors and co-designers of the city’s future. Organizers, cultural workers, youth leaders, elders, nonprofit partners, and governance actors will collaborate with the Oakland community to develop shared language, systems literacy, and practical tools aligned with a thriving future for Oakland. Across all dimensions of the work, imagination, cultural memory, and community governance will be treated as legitimate forms of evidence and strategy.
What This Grant Will Support
Over the next two years, the Oakland Horizon Story Project will develop:
- An Oakland Horizon Story synthesis with cultural artifacts
- Documentation of key tipping points and leverage opportunities
- Campaign and governance prototypes
- A prototype Thriving Index
- A participatory strategy game
- Learning briefs and field documentation
These tools are intended to help communities move beyond reactive problem-solving and toward proactive, community-shaped futures.
Why This Matters
Support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is deeply meaningful. RWJF is one of the nation’s leading philanthropies focused on health and health equity, working to build a future where health is no longer a privilege, but a right.
Their investment reflects the growing recognition that storytelling, civic imagination, belonging, and community power are essential ingredients in creating healthier futures.
For BCN, this grant also strengthens the organization’s ability to continue building durable infrastructure for transformational work rooted in Oakland and beyond.
Join Us in Shaping Oakland’s Future
The Oakland Horizon Story Project will be strongest when it is shaped by the wisdom, lived experience, and creativity of the people who call Oakland home.
BCN invites Oakland residents, youth leaders, elders, artists, organizers, educators, healers, institutions, funders, and values-aligned partners to join this effort.
Whether through storytelling, collaboration, strategy, cultural practice, or support, there is a place for everyone in this work.
To learn more, collaborate, or stay connected, visit:
https://www.belovedcommunitiesnetwork.org/our-programs/the-oakland-horizon-story-project/
About Beloved Communities Network
Beloved Communities Network (BCN) is a movement-building organization dedicated to advancing healing, belonging, collective imagination, and systems transformation. Through community-rooted initiatives, leadership development, storytelling, and cross-sector collaboration, BCN works to help communities build more just, connected, and thriving futures.
Learn more at:
https://www.belovedcommunitiesnetwork.org
About Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is a leading national philanthropy dedicated to improving health and health equity in the United States. Working alongside communities, policymakers, practitioners, and researchers, RWJF seeks to dismantle barriers to health and create lasting systems change so everyone has a fair and just opportunity to thrive.
Learn more at:
https://www.rwjf.org
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Contact:
Beloved Communities Network
Muhammad McCabe, Director of Marketing and Communications
muhammad@belovedcommunitiesnetwork.org
(408)410-7669
https://www.belovedcommunitiesnetwork.org