In an era of outputs, metrics, and KPIs, the word ‘trust’ can feel like a soft term – abstract, fuzzy, and difficult to quantify. Yet in Local Area Coordination (LAC), trust is not just a nice-to-have; it is the foundation upon which everything else is built. Without trust, LAC simply doesn’t work.

What if we started thinking of trust not as an intangible quality, but as infrastructure? As something as solid and vital as a bridge, a broadband line, or a public park? In this article, we’ll explore how Local Area Coordination builds, protects, and mobilises trust as a tangible community asset, and why that might be one of its most profound contributions to long-term social change.

Trust begins before the first conversation

Trust is something easily taken for granted, and it’s often overlooked in service design. There’s a natural assumption that a person drawing on a support service will trust the professional, simply because they’re an expert in their field. However, like any meaningful relationship, trust is something built over time – through listening, mutual respect, valuing each other’s experience and perspectives, and being consistently present. These components of trust-building are woven into the Local Area Coordination approach.

LACs form relationships by ‘being there’ – showing up in the community without a pre-set agenda, learning the local context, and listening deeply to people. When someone feels truly listened to, without the pressure of ticking boxes or having their problems solved for them, it maintains (or sometimes reawakens) their sense of agency. People don’t feel ‘worked on’. They feel seen. By showing up consistently and focusing on building relationships first, trust is built over time.

Local Area Coordinators as ‘trust builders’

Local Area Coordinators often support people to mend fractured relationships – between people and services, within families, and in wider communities. In this role, LACs act as trust builders. On one hand, they may lend a microphone to people who have felt unheard by the service system. On the other, they help people to see the human face of support services so that when people do need more formal support, they are introduced to a person, not referred to a faceless system. All of this is essential for building trust quickly and meaningfully.

Trust as prevention

Trust is an essential part of preventing crisis. Building trust and connections between people creates a network of natural support that can be drawn on before, during, and after an emergency. Feeling like a connected and contributing part of a community helps people to stay healthy and well for longer. It also provides a sense of security and reduces pressure on emergency services, social care, and mental health interventions.

The trust built between an LAC and a person they are alongside often extends outward. When someone who has felt isolated starts connecting with others, feels a sense of belonging, or makes a contribution to the benefit of others, the impact radiates. People begin to trust each other more, others reciprocate with their contributions, and when trust exists during times of real hardship, people are more likely to ask for support early on before things reach a crisis point. They’re more likely to share their whole story, not just a version shaped by fear, shame, or the narrow criteria of what a service can respond to.

Local Area Coordinators take time to build trust with and between people, not because it’s a nice option to have, but because trust is essential for helping people grow, strengthening community resilience, and ensuring people can access the right support, at the right time, in the right way.

Measuring the immeasurable

One of the greatest challenges for LAC (and one of its most exciting new frontiers) is finding ways to capture the value of trust. Traditional outcome measures don’t always reflect the emotional safety, personal confidence, or social bridging that trust makes possible.

Many councils involved in Local Area Coordination are exploring new forms of monitoring and evaluation such as story-based data, connection mapping, and personal accounts of progress, alongside the wealth of evidence collected. Others are embracing the idea that some of the most important things in community life can’t be precisely measured, but must still be fiercely protected.

Protecting our most valuable asset

Trust takes time to build, seconds to lose, and consistent effort to maintain. In Local Area Coordination, we treat trust not as a vague feeling, but as a vital, tangible asset, and one that underpins everything we do.

As systems seek to redesign support around prevention, participation, and place-based solutions, they would do well to build outward from trust as an essential strategic resource. Because when trust grows, people thrive, and support for communities becomes less about money and services, and more about relationships.