The ABQ Accent · City of Albuquerque - Office of Civic Engagement

The ABQ Accent | EP 40 - Marisa Magallanez

January 29, 2026·32 min·5 clips

Mariah Harrison opens the conversation by welcoming Marisa Magallanes as an old friend and a leader whose voice has stayed in the back of her mind. Marisa is introduced as president and CEO of the Albuquerque Community Foundation and the New Mexico Community Trust. The tone stays personal from the start. Mariah says she wants to spend more time in this conversation, and Marisa meets that energy with the same easy register. From there, the episode keeps circling back to the idea that philanthropic work should be rooted in real relationships. Marisa talks about how her team thought carefully about what it means to be in relationship with the community. That thinking led to long conversations across sectors and with residents. The goal was not just to announce a program. It was to understand what transformational relationships actually look like. Out of that process came Rooted Together, a two-year initiative in its beta cycle. The focus is neighborhood development and neighborhood improvement shaped by the voices and perspective of the people who live there. The foundation is working with Street Vision, an organization doing innovative housing in the International District. The investment is described plainly: $200,000 to help Street Vision keep being a spark in the healing and prosperity of that neighborhood. The episode keeps local people in view. It emphasizes that the voice of the people affected by the work is ever present. It also shows how a community foundation can act as a connector. The money supporting the initiative is not only coming from the foundation itself. It is coming from corporate partners. It is coming from donor-advised fund holders. It is coming from the community through grassroots fundraising. That mix matters to the conversation. It is presented as a real example of mobilizing and stewarding resources with intention. The show makes room for the mechanics of grantmaking without losing the human side. Mariah keeps reflecting back Marisa's answers as evidence of community meaning. Marisa keeps returning to curiosity, collaboration, and the hope that people want work that is real and meaningful. The final stretch lands softly but clearly on that idea. The work is not framed as abstract philanthropy. It is framed as people showing up for one another, building trust, and putting money behind a shared future.

As heard by us

A grounded philanthropy conversation about place, community voice, and how change gets funded.

Marisa Magallanes is framed as the president and CEO of the Albuquerque Community Foundation and the New Mexico Community Trust, and that role gives the conversation its center of gravity: philanthropy shaped by community voice, relationships, and neighborhood-led change.

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Why you'd press play

You want a grounded look at how Albuquerque philanthropy turns listening into action.

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