"I was tired of watching problems go unsolved because no one wanted to touch the ugly parts."
— Val Wimes, Founder
The Sameritan Project was founded in 2023 and activated in 2025, when the LA fires made it undeniably clear what this nonprofit was actually built for. While closing out consulting contracts in 2024, we watched institutions scramble. We saw the gaps. And we knew it was time to step in, really step in. We built something. And it worked. That proof lives in our Projects.
About
For too long, institutions have responded to crises with reports, committees, and temporary fixes. Some data is collected, consultants are brought in, including us, in our previous life, but implementation stalls. Solutions look promising on paper, yet rarely take root in practice.
After years of watching brilliant engagements produce reports instead of results, we decided to change that. We stopped advising and started building. We go beneath the surface to straighten out the bottlenecks others won't touch. We don't just identify gaps, we close them. We don't produce reports, we produce proof.
Proof Over Theory
We don't say it works. We show it works. Every model we build is tested in the real world before we ask anyone to adopt it.
Dignity by Design
Dignity isn't added as an afterthought. It's built into the structure.
Circular by Default
Waste is just a resource in the wrong place. Every system we design starts with the question: what happens to what's left over?
We Value
Community as Infrastructure
Not charity. Not service delivery. Actual systems that communities own, operate, and benefit from
Meet the CEO
Valarie "Val" Wimes is a strategist, humanitarian, and systems thinker who doesn't just identify gaps — she builds what's missing.
After a decade advising nonprofits, governments, and mission-driven organizations, she kept seeing the same pattern: brilliant people, real urgency, and solutions that stalled because no one wanted to do the unglamorous work of actually building something. So she stopped advising and started building.
Her frontline work in community engagement, food systems, policy, and resilience planning revealed what the world actually needs, not more frameworks, but people willing to test working models under real conditions and document what happens. That's what The Sameritan Project is. And she's on a mission to create more Good Sameritans, people and institutions empowered to solve problems together, with systems that actually work despite how hard it may seem to be.
Why "Sameritan"?
We spell it with an e intentionally. Our work is grounded in merit — the belief that lasting systems are built by recognizing and activating what already has value, rather than assuming what's missing.
Our Board
Cameron McKnight
Ebony Lynk
Maybe you...
We're building a board of people who believe execution beats theory. We're selective and intentional about who joins — but if you think you belong here, we'd love to hear from you.