Friday, June 5   12:30-5:30pm

General Information: Participants will be able to join each experience on a first-come, first-served, basis. Please let us know your preference as soon as possible. Participants will be picked-up at the University of Richmond at 12:30 pm, driven to their respective sites, and dropped off at the University of Richmond by 5:30 pm.

• Healing History – Hope in the Cities is partnering with History Healing and Hope to offer participants a glimpse into some of Richmond’s slave history. Be part of a guided tour of the historic sites in Richmond, including a walk on the historic Slave Trail and a visit to the Reconciliation Statue. Then explore the American Civil War Center at Historic Tredegar, and engage in an in-depth discussion of your experience.

• Healthy Integrated Schools – Hope in the Cities, in partnership with Richmond Hill, the Micah Initiative and Richmond Public Schools, brings you an in-depth honest conversation on the issues surrounding education. After a brief visit to the Civil Rights Monument at the State Capitol to recall Richmond’s history of school desegregation, a diverse group of PTA leaders, educators and business people will gather at Richmond Hill, an ecumenical retreat center that overlooks the city, to dialogue about the "trust factors" needed to build healthy integrated public schools (HIP Schools) and expand the credible choices for everyone.

• Inclusive Communities – In order to create inclusive communities, a host of citizen groups must be nurtured and integrated into the fabric of communities. Experience one of four ways in which the Richmond community is creating inclusive communities by building trust among four different citizen groups:

  • Ex-offenders: see what Boaz & Ruth and the North Richmond HOPE Council, in conjunction with the Richmond Midnight Basketball League (RMBL) and the Resource Information Help for Disadvantaged (RIHD), are doing to develop both the social and trade skills of ex-offenders with the purpose of re-integrating them into the community.

  • Local Growers and Businesses partnerships: visit Ellwood Thompson’s and Tricycle Gardens and see how Ellwood Thompson’s, a local business, is supporting local growers, and promoting community gardens, such as Tricycle Gardens.

  • Affordable Housing: engage with the Better Housing Coalition and the Legal Aid Justice Center as they endeavor to provide equal housing opportunities for lower income citizens.

  • Faith and Immigrant Communities: hear from participants in the Hope in the Cities’ Muslim/Evangelical Christian dialogues, and engage with members of the immigrant, Hispanic community as they share the importance of honest conversations and trustbuilding in creating harmonious communities.

Healing History

History Healing & Hope (HHH)

This community group of diverse individuals from across the metro Richmond area came together in 2002 after several Hope in the Cities dialogues on Race, Economics and Jurisdiction. HHH labors to honestly examine and clarify our nation's Civil War history, to grieve the profound and enduring losses suffered by hundreds of thousands of people, North and South, enslaved and free, and to celebrate and build upon the progress toward reconciliation and healing. HHH holds public events, visits historic sites, and holds community dialogues in an effort to heal the history of this area.  

Slave Trail

Beginning at Manchester Docks on the James River, the Slave Trail physically outlines the path countless slaves traveled on their demoralizing journey through forced servitude to and from Richmond. Richmond became the largest source of enslaved Africans on the east coast of America from 1830 to 1860 during the notorious down river slave trade.

Richmond Reconciliation Statue

At the site of the former slave market in Shockoe Bottom, the Richmond Reconciliation Statue is one of three reconciliation statues making up the Hope in the Cities reconciliation triangle project. Unlike its international counterparts in Liverpool and Benin, the Richmond Reconciliation Statue represents the end of the slave trade triangle honoring kidnapped Africans and their descendants who were torn from their families and “sold down the river” to Southern plantations.

American Civil War Center

Located in the 1861 Tredegar Gun Foundry, the American Civil War Center is a one of a kind Civil War museum. The Center, whose mission is to tell the whole story of the conflict that still shapes our nation, is uniquely told from the perspective of all three main parties involved in the conflict. Upon entry, visitors learn about the causes of the Civil War and continue to move into the War years through the eyes of the African American, Unionist, and Confederate perspective ending with its legacies that molded the country we know today.

Healthy Integrated Schools

Richmond Hill

Within the setting of a historic monastery, Richmond Hill is an ecumenical Christian fellowship and residential community who serve as stewards of an urban retreat center. It is located at the city’s highest point, just down the road from the location Patrick Henry delivered his famous challenge, “give me liberty, or give me death.” The Residential Community of Richmond Hill prays three times daily for Metropolitan Richmond, a covenant that started after the Civil War as Bishop McGill looked out across war-torn Richmond feeling an urgent call to pray for the city.

Micah Initiative

The Micah Initiative is a partnership program between churches, synagogues, mosques and other communities of faith in metropolitan Richmond and the Richmond Public Schools for the purpose of supporting the education and the nurture of the children of Richmond. The Richmond Public Schools serve the most distressed portion of our metropolitan city’s school age population. Today more than 40 faith communities and 24 of Richmond’s elementary schools are involved in the program.

Inclusive Communities

Boaz & Ruth

Planted in the center of Highland Park, one of Richmond’s most troubled areas,Boaz & Ruth rebuilds lives and communities through relationships, training, transitional jobs and economic revitalization.

Richmond Midnight Basketball League

Since 1995, the Richmond Midnight Basketball League has been working to meet the recreational and societal needs of underserved youth and young adults. They offer youth (ages 11-17) and young adults (ages 18-28) a safe place to play basketball and exposure to positive values.

Resource Information Help for the Disadvantaged

RIHD is a nonprofit, all volunteer, statewide organization dedicated to reducing crime & recidivism through activities that promote education for at risk youth; prisoner and former felons' self-rehabilitation.

Ellwood Thompson’s Natural Market 

At the corner of Ellwood Avenue and N. Thompson Street, the Ellwood Thompson’s Natural Market plays an integral part in creating inclusive communities through its dedication to sustainable practices and commitment to supporting local farmers and the community. Their goal is to provide information and tools to help their community be as healthy as possible, physiologically and ecologically.

Tricycle Gardens

Just on the south side of the James River on 7th Street, Tricycle Gardens is a dynamic and action oriented community of individuals working together to create a greener Richmond through establishing community gardens. Tricycle Gardens also provides educational programs for the public presenting the positive effects of community gardens on environmental sustainability and personal health.

Better Housing Coalition

The gap between the cost of housing remains too wide for many working families. The Better Housing Coalition helps individuals in the Richmond Region by building high quality; affordable housing to people who otherwise might not be able to afford it. BHC makes it possible for a diverse, mixed-income group to rent or buy a safe, well-built home, from senior apartments, to single-family homes, to everything in between.

Legal Aid Justice Center

With offices in Downtown Richmond, the Legal Aid Justice Center provides legal representation to those in the community who have the least access to legal resources. They are committed to providing a full range of services to their clients, the core of which provide assistance to individuals and families in Central Virginia who face legal dilemmas related to housing, public benefits, employment, consumer protection, or the rights of the elderly, institutionalized persons, and other vulnerable populations.