About RVA Thrives
RVA Thrives is Virginia Community Voice’s community engagement program in Richmond’s Southside (see map below)
PURPOSE: To build power and grow neighborhood leadership over decisions affecting Richmond’s Southside focusing on practical and policy solutions for issues such as:
equitable residential and commercial development
food insecurity
green initiatives
leadership development
youth engagement
community healing.
RVA Thrives is a series of vital programs led by a Steering Committee composed of neighbors across Richmond’s Southside who have demonstrated commitment to bringing about positive change in their community.
The RVA Thrives Steering Committee created sub-committees, called working groups. Their purpose is to engage and connect the communities on Richmond’s Southside to create and implement solutions to problem areas selected by the community.
We currently have the following Working Groups:
Housing Group - Influence decisions made about the built environment that benefit everyone.
Greening Group - Address food injustice and promote community access to healthy food and environmental advocacy
Art, Racial Reconciliation and Civic Advocacy (ARCA)- Creative placemaking led by youth ages 14-18 years to use art to support civic advocacy and racial reconciliation in their communities.
RVA thrives has two new projects :
This program is a pipeline for recruiting, training, and preparing more South Richmond residents for leadership roles, within RVA Thrives and beyond the organization. The mission of the Leadership Academy is to engage Southside Richmond neighbors to connect them to their inherent power so that they become leaders of change in their communities.
Southside Center for Rest & Healing
VACV is developing a “healing hub” in South Richmond = Southside Center for Rest & Healing. This project is a groundbreaking approach to holistic community healing, designed in response to the direct feedback from over 300 local neighbors, collected between 2022-2024.
What we mean when we say Richmond’s Southside -
Route 1 corridor | Formerly redlined Neighborhoods | For those familiar with Richmond we say "from the River to Walmsley blvd."
