Bellagio Residency: April 2022
Project: “Grassroots Transparency-building: a community-based method for preventing corruption and improving security in rural, conflictive and underserved areas”
Ellen Calmus is the founder and director of The Corner Institute (Instituto del Rincón), a Mexican nonprofit dedicated to the educational and economic development of the poorest, most vulnerable rural populations. Awarded Mexico’s Quetzalcóatl for her support to migrants’ families and children, El Rincón’s location in a region increasingly infiltrated by organized crime brought them growing numbers of pleas for help from people unable to access desperately-needed services from local agencies without having to endure abusive treatment or pay irregular charges. Ellen devoted her Bellagio residency to writing about the community-based Grassroots Transparency method her organization developed to prevent corruption.