Civic Infrastructure: Assessment and Planning

Every community has a civic infrastructure - formal and informal processes and networks through which communities make decisions and attempt to solve problems. The quality of a community's civic infrastructure determines that community's health - economic, civic, and social. It is the base upon which a healthy community is constructed. Successful communities honor and nurture their civic infrastructures.

The National Civic League developed the Civic Index to help communities unleash their power and abilities by evaluating and improving their civic infrastructures. Whether the specific issue is a struggling school system, an air pollution problem, or a lack of adequate low income housing, the need for effective problem-solving and leadership skills is the same. The Civic Index provides a framework within which communities can increase their problems solving capacity.

Through the Civic Index process, CS facilitators convene diverse groups of citizens to dialogue on community issues, identify strengths and challenges, and then structuring collaborative solutions to problems. Creating civic infrastructure is not an end in itself. Rather, it is a community's first step toward its capacity to deal with critical issues.