But when her son's head began to hurt recently and she took him to see the doctor, the clinic was full. They told Ariza to take her 10-year-old son to the emergency room, where Ariza knew it would cost a lot more.

She's now working out a payment plan with UNC Hospitals, but Ariza said families like hers need more choices.

"When you have an urgent-care need, you [either] don't go to the doctor or you go to the emergency room," she said.

Now a new coalition that listened to Ariza on Sunday has pledged to work to improve health-care access and tackle other problems in the community.

The Orange County Organizing Committee -- the name is temporary -- assembled what organizers called "a historic mix of Anglos, Latinos and African-Americans" for the meeting on Rogers Road. Members of 23 houses of worship and other organizations attended, filling the Faith Tabernacle Oasis of Love International Church to near standing room only.

The coalition has been quietly interviewing Orange County residents for two years to learn about their concerns with education, health care, jobs and wages and other issues. A group of black ministers started the process by contracting with the Industrial Areas Foundation, one of the oldest and largest community organizing networks in the country. The IAF has helped build 67 similar organizations, including Durham's Congregations, Associations and Neighborhoods (CAN).

Orange County's inequities may not be as apparent as Durham's. But that doesn't mean they're not there, said Rabbi Jennifer Feldman of the Chapel Hill Kehillah.

"When people get outside their isolated communities, the picture of Orange County is much more complicated," she said. "You don't have to go much farther than down Franklin Street or across the tracks in Carrboro."

Sitting alone or in groups of a dozen or more, people Sunday gathered beneath signs identifying their church or community organization. Members walked to the front of the chapel and announced how many representatives they had with them and how much money they had raised to help staff the new committee.

By the end of the hour-long meeting, $19,400 had been pledged.

The committee has identified five priorities: the environment, health care, housing, living wages and education. It next plans to hold two workshops to train local citizens to be community leaders.

In Durham, similar assemblies have drawn elected leaders from the city council, county commissioners and school board who pledged to work on lead paint removal, living wage ordinances and other issues that Durham's CAN identified as needs.

A handful of Orange County politicians attended Sunday's assembly, including Chapel Hill Town Council members Mark Kleinschmidt and Bill Thorpe, Carrboro Alderman Dan Coleman and Chapel Hill-Carrboro school board members Lisa Stuckey and Jean Hamilton.