The Youth Crisis Network (YCN) is an alliance of human service agencies and school systems located in northwestern Connecticut that share a mutual concern about suicidal youth and other youth in crisis. The YCN provides system networking, coordination, collaboration, and advocacy aimed at developing quality services for youth at risk and youth in crisis. The Network was initially organized around an identified regional need for emergency psychiatric evaluation and treatment of suicidal adolescents. The YCN covers a varied geographical area and is comprised of an array of service providers, each with different target populations. The basic philosophy of the YCN is to promote maximum utilization of existing services for youth through networking. The individuals representing the YCN are primarily front line professionals. Though no one is a trained community organizer, it is apparent when tracing the development of the YCN that specific steps of community organization have been key to its success. The history of the Network is summarized and the organizational steps in the Network's evolution are outlined. Areas of focus are: (1) organization strategies to forge and maintain collaboration of community resources; (2) steps and problem solving involved in writing protocol for community-wide postvention response to completed suicides; (3) goals and accomplishments of the YCN; and (4) exploration of the potential impact of a regional network on suicide prevention. (LLL)