Community Needs Assessment Overview

Community Action Agencies (CAA), created through Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty, serve nearly every community throughout the United States. Over 1,000 agencies provide the opportunity to live in decency and dignity. To determine which services each CAA should be providing in their community, the Community Services Block Grant Act, under Section 676(b)(11) requires the CAA to conduct a Community Needs Assessment (CNA) every three years.

The purpose of the CNA is to:

• Collect and analyze data about the needs of our community that have low incomes
• Inform future funding decisions
• Inform policy and program decisions

2027 Community Needs Assessment

Clark County is currently working to update the Community Needs Assessment, which will be published in summer 2027.

Each time Clark County undergoes the needs assessment process, we look to enhance the process and results of the previous process. For the 2027 Clark County Community Needs Assessment, staff enlisted the help of Community Action Advisory Board members and local stakeholders to provide feedback and expertise through each step of the needs assessment process.

The steps and current progress for the 2027 Community Needs Assessment are below.

Step 1: Survey of Needs

Clark County conducts an in-depth survey of households who identify as having a low income. All information is strictly confidential and optional. The survey was available in hard copy and online in English, Spanish, Russian, Ukrainian and Chuukese. 

Surveys were distributed through partnerships with over 100 community partners, through social media, news releases, local newspaper articles and distributed at several community meetings. Responses to the survey were collected from January 1, 2026, through March 31, 2026. A total of 1731 responses were received.

The survey covers several different areas of service and asks what the households top needs are in each category.

Areas of Need:

• Employment
• Education
• Housing
• Income and Asset Building
• Physical Health
• Behavioral Health
• Support Services
• Barriers

Survey respondents are also presented with a list of various areas of need and asked to rank their family’s need in the past year as high, medium, low, or not a need. This information gives a high-level overview of the needs in the community and helps identify trend data.

The next component of the survey is collecting demographic information. This information is completely optional and helps us better understand the households in need.

The final section of the survey is an opportunity for respondents to provide additional comments and sign up for participating in forums and/or interviews to be used in the final assessment. 

Step 2: Consultant Review

All data from the surveys is sent to an independent consultant that has experience with conducting full community needs assessments. The consultant looks for bias within the responses and trends among the data. The consultant designs the charts that are used showing survey responses throughout the report.

Step 3: Community Forums

Once all survey responses were collected and the data was reviewed by our consultant, we conducted a series of community feedback forums in October 2026. The forums were structured to elicit feedback on the survey findings, generate discussion on unaddressed needs, and gather suggestions for community improvements. One online forum and three in-person forums were held throughout the county. 

If you were not able to attend these forums but would still like to view the survey data and provide feedback, you can view a forum recording below. This forum includes links for virtual participation.

Step 4: Other Report Review

Throughout the needs assessment process, CNA Task Force members and staff collected reports from other agencies about our community. Some provided data that was used to identify the causes and conditions of poverty in Clark County. Some reports provided supporting information about the needs identified by survey respondents.

Step 5: Community Needs Assessment Adoption

The final step of the process will be to take all the information gleaned from the survey responses, community forums and review of other reports and create the Clark County Community Needs Assessment. County staff will draft the initial assessment which will be reviewed and updated by the CNA Task Force. Once all parties provide feedback, the final version will be provided to the Community Action Advisory Board for adoption in March 2027.

Once the final draft is adopted, the report will be translated into all the languages the original Survey of Needs was provided in. A news release will be published, and the final report will be sent to all the partners who helped with the needs assessment process, anyone who expressed interest in having a copy of the report when completing the Survey of Needs, to elected officials and local funders of social services. We anticipate publishing the final report in summer 2027.

If you would like a printed copy of the report, please email CommunityAction@clark.wa.gov. We will do our best to get you a copy. Please include your name, address and which language you prefer.

2024 Community Needs Assessment

The most recent Community Needs Assessment was completed in 2024. Surveys were distributed from February 2, 2023 through April 14, 2023 and received 893 responses. Surveys were distributed through news releases, social media, and over 100 partner organizations and were available in hard copies in English, Spanish, Russian, Vietnamese and Chuukese and online in English, Spanish, Russian and Vietnamese. Community forums were held in January 2024 and the final report was adopted by the Community Action Advisory Board in May 2024.

Special Thanks to the Community Needs Assessment Task Force!

This integral team works with staff over an 18-month period to develop every component of the CNA process from reviewing the Survey of Needs, creating the Community Forum, and reviewing the final draft. The CNA Task Force reviewed, provided feedback and reviewed information again throughout the process, making sure to incorporate an equity lens so that all the components were more accessible to low-income community members. 

How to get involved

If you are interested in helping with the next needs assessment process, please let us know. We want to make sure that everyone has a chance to identify the needs their household has so we can direct funding to the most appropriate and needed services. Please email CommunityAction@clark.wa.gov if you would be interested in:

• Distributing surveys to people who are low income.
• Participating in focus groups and/or community forums to provide feedback on survey results.