Building a community network for a cancer education/screening program: the process and lessons learned (or relearned)

Similar to many communities around the United States in the late 1990s, Muncie, Indiana, and the surrounding county created a year 2000 committee, called, "You and Year 2000, Inc.: The Muncie and Delaware County Millennium Project" to sponsor, plan, and conduct activities to celebrate the new millennium and ponder the community's past, present, and path to the future. Part of the Committee's planning was to create a legacy of the year-long celebration that would attack a community problem. Partnering with the local hospital, the Committee decided to attack the problem of cancer through a fund-raising campaign to build a cancer center and cancer education/screening program. The purpose of this article is to describe the application of a community organizing/building model used to create a community-wide cancer education/screening program and share the lessons learned (or relearned). The planning process used to develop the education/screening program is one that could be duplicated elsewhere.