About Us

We know that local environments impact health. We also know that people who experience the greatest inequity in health often have the least amount of power to influence changes in the policies, systems, and environments that impact them. MOVE is a grassroots community engagement strategy empowering communities to leverage digital stories and face-to-face organizing to influence policy, systems, and environmental change.  Our vision is for communities disproportionately impacted by policy decisions to have the capacity to produce, disseminate, and utilize culturally and linguistically relevant digital stories to increase equity.

Our History:

MOVE emerged in response to an RFP from Public Health – Seattle & King County’s Communities Putting Prevention to Work (CPPW) initiative. Four community-based agencies developed a proposal based on preliminary successes with digital storytelling to harness the power of stories to promote changes related to healthy eating, active living, and tobacco prevention. We accomplish this by combining grassroots organizing with new media technology rooted in story. Our approach is based on our belief that telling our stories can engage new leaders in neighborhoods disproportionately impacted by inequities, strengthen grassroots organizations’ ability to advocate on their own behalf, and lead to social justice.  The founding partners helped community members produce over 100 multilingual digital stories during the course of the twenty-one month grant period and showed these stories to decision-makers in a series of community forums and other venues. Excited by the concrete policy and systems changes we’ve seen and widespread support, the partners are now committed to broadening the focus and reach of MOVE, both in terms of issues and geographic region. Download the MOVE strategic framework.

What's On This Website?:

This website showcases multilingual digital stories produced by community members and a local map that illustrates policies that are improving health. MOVE currently features on-going changes that improve healthy eating and physical activity and create tobacco-free environments in King County. We are in the process of expanding our focus to include other health-related topics including women's health, cancer, infant mortality, and cardiovascular disease.  

MOVE Goals:

1. To visually demonstrate health inequities and positive changes in King County.
 2. To highlight local Communities Putting Prevention to Work (CPPW) efforts to improve health through policy, systems and environmental changes.
 3. To foster local partnerships among CPPW grantees and partners to map data, share media and resources, and take collective action.
MOVE partners use the map and embedded media to promote healthy equity with two distinct audiences:
 1. Peer education workshops to mobilize residents in neighborhoods disproportionately impacted by chronic health issues.
  2. Public forums for decision makers. Take a look at the series of launch events with elected officials in fall of 2011.

Why a media map?

Maps are a particularly effective tool for visually "seeing" the disproportionate access to healthy places along income and color lines in King County. Community members are using a participatory mapping process to identify, analyze, and act upon health issues while building local capacity in multimedia technology. The MOVE website is multilingual, engaging diverse audiences across sectors through both quantitative data and narrative testimonials.In addition to embedded community media, users can  search for places that have increased access to healthy eating, active living, and tobacco prevention (i.e. healthy corner stores, tobacco free housing, etc.)

The infrastructure of the MOVE map is designed to make it simple for allies to add other data fields and to use the map for future policy work.

Please consider supporting the MOVE Project through a donation.

If you have questions about MOVE, please get in touch. We'd love to hear from you!