Project Vida begins with the understanding that communities, like people, are living organisms. Children and adults, businesses and schools, churches and public systems interact to form an identity and a lifestyle. Project Vida takes seriously the life of the community and the individual as a whole.

Project Vida is located in the center of El Paso, three blocks north of the Rio Grande border with México. The neighborhood is one of the most impoverished in the USA. Project Vida programs emerge from an ongoing community dialogue; those programs have spread to other areas of El Paso County and the adjoining Hudspeth County.