Walking the Distance for a Thriving Future
I’m in Ngilai, Northern Kenya. The settlements are spread broadly across the land, nestled in the beautiful but formidable Mathews Mountain Range. It isn’t always easy to travel here, and yet, for the opportunity to share their vision for their homeland, it’s worth it for so many local Samburu people.
I learn of a woman who was unable to make the car pickup on the day of her zone’s Legacy Planning meeting due to her responsibilities in the morning. But she had never been asked her opinions and desires for the future, and this opportunity was not one she was willing to miss. She walked close to four hours roundtrip to contribute her hopes to the visioning of the Legacy Plan. And she was not alone.
Claire Poelking (left) with Walter Lenolngenje, Legado's Program Manager, Kenya, and Katie Bernhard, Legado's Head of Impact, in Wamba, Kenya | Legado
In late 2025, I had the good fortune of spending three months with Legado while on a sabbatical from my own work focused on supporting holistic community well-being at a donor organization. I was eager to see Legado’s Thriving Futures process up close, to better understand how it fosters community-led change that fully incorporates the many factors influencing community and environmental well-being.
In early November, I joined Legado in Wamba, Kenya, to participate in a workshop with Ngilai Wildlife Community Conservancy members. The goal of our time together was to support the community as it planned how it would continue implementing the priorities in its Legacy Plan. The Legacy Plan was launched in 2024, and throughout 2025, the community had already worked diligently to put its priorities into action. The group was eager to keep momentum going into the next year.
The landscepe in Ngilai, Northern Kenya | Legado
But first, let’s rewind a bit to appreciate what it took to get to the Legacy Plan. Ngilai consists of 12 settlements made up of approximately 11,000 people. To visit both the eastern most and western most settlement in one day takes close to five hours one-way, includes about a dozen potential washout spots and the literal ups and downs of navigating the Matthews mountain range. That is if you have access to a car—and both vehicles and cell phone service can be hard to come by out there. All this to say, Ngilai is a very large area with some very real challenges to representation and participation in decision making. Despite the challenges, Legado held dozens meetings across the landscape to ensure voices from across the Conservancy could be heard, paying particular attention to the inclusion of women and youth—including the woman I mentioned in my introduction.
The process, as well as the outcomes, matter to individuals, to communities, and to healthy, thriving places.
We started the 2026 planning workshop by reflecting on 2025. What had been achieved: a new maternity shelter, increased enrollment and retention of students, mended gullies to reduce erosion. But perhaps what received the most celebration was the work of women’s groups to remove invasive species from grazing lands, which helped improve the quantity and quality of native plants for cattle. The areas that had received dedicated attention were fenced off and recovering remarkably well.
- First, everyone recognized the interconnected benefits. Cattle are culturally, economically, and nutritionally valuable to the community, so more and better food for the cows equates directly to holistic health of the community: improving economic security, providing more money for school fees, and producing more nutritious milk. Protecting native plants also makes the landscape more resilient in the face of climate change.
- Second, was pride. This initiative was self-determined, -directed, and -executed. No outside organizations or government entities played a role; it was sheer dedication and perseverance. And hours and hours and hours of labor weeding, digging, and disposing of stubborn plants. Any time the invasive species removal came up, smiles lit up the room, often paired with the refrain, “our women did that.” There was well-deserved pride that women from the community came together to make such important contributions to heal their shared landscape.
Samburu women gather to take collective action on the community-determined priorities in their Legacy Plan, such as removing invasive species, restoring degraded land, and more | Roshni Lodhia/Legado
When it came time to plan for 2026, you bet that invasive species removal on more land parcels was at the top of the list. The Conservancy’s land manager asked if there could be a sub-task that included creating signs recognizing the women’s groups work at each of the restoration sites. This would be both an acknowledgement of their efforts and, hopefully, serve as inspiration for others to do the same in their settlements.
To me, the whole week, and especially this one example, demonstrated the importance of community-led change. Legado provided the scaffolding—the Legacy Planning process, the meeting structure and cadence, logistical support, and technical expertise. But the Ngilai Community Conservancy members set the priorities, took individual and communal responsibility for implementing the Legacy Plan, and owned the successes. When the Ngilai Community Conservancy becomes an alumni of Legado, I trust the Thriving Futures process, and how it encourages representation, communal decision making, and pride in community-led accomplishments, will not just remain, but thrive—supporting long-lasting, holistic, and community-led change for the people and their land.