Who We Are
IncludUs is a national nonprofit that helps cities work better for everyone — partnering with local governments and communities to build the civic, economic, wellbeing, and climate infrastructure that makes inclusive cities possible.
We align culture, community trust, and institutional accountability — ensuring that the people closest to a challenge are embedded in the systems that solve it, not positioned outside of them.
Most institutions struggle not because communities lack engagement, but because their systems were never designed to integrate community leadership, decision-making authority, and operational capacity. IncludUs redesigns that alignment. We engineer durable systems that translate inclusion from aspiration into institutional reality.
OUR OPERATING FRAMEWORK
COMMUNITY ENGINEERING
Community Engineering™ is the methodology developed by IncludUs Labs and deployed by IncludUs Fund. It is a four-layer framework that aligns:
• People + Culture — who belongs, who participates, who feels represented
• Governance Design — how decisions are made, shared ownership, accountability
• Infrastructure Systems — technology, physical assets, service delivery, access
• Outcome Learning — feedback loops, continuous improvement, what's working
When these layers operate in isolation, friction scales. When they align, communities gain durable power — and cities work better for everyone.
OUR
MISSION
To engineer for a more inclusive world — we do this by developing cities where every resident has economic power, civic voice, and the ability to thrive — by partnering with local governments and community organizations to build the infrastructure that makes lasting inclusion possible.
OUR VISION
Cities where community engineering is the standard — where every investment in civic, economic, wellbeing, and climate infrastructure is designed with the people it serves, creating power that compounds across generations.
RESEARCH
PARTNER
IncludUs is developing the first national U.S. Inclusion Index — a proprietary measurement framework built by our in-house research team to track belonging, equity, and inclusion across institutions and sectors. The Index gives cities and funders the data infrastructure they need for accountability and investment decisions. Launching 2026.
Why Partner with Us
OUR
CORE VALUES
1 / Opportunity
We believe everyone deserves fair access to resources, power, and the ability to shape their future — no matter their background.
2 / Innovation
We embrace bold thinking and creative solutions that are rooted in the real needs of communities — and designed to last.
3 / Collaboration
We believe deep partnerships, shared ownership, and collective leadership drive the most meaningful and scalable change.
4 / Empowerment
We develop leaders and communities to build, own, and sustain their own solutions — not just participate in ours. The exit strategy is always community ownership.