“Solutions Salon” Brings West Oakland Community Together

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OAKLAND, CA, March 11, 2011 – Lyn Hikida – More than 40 people participated in a solutions-oriented community meeting hosted in West Oakland last Thursday by the Acorn Residents Council, BRIDGE Housing, and The John Stewart Company.

The “Solutions Salon” attracted representatives from 20 nonprofit organizations and the Oakland City Council, Oakland Housing Authority, the Oakland Police Department and the Oakland Unified School District. Attendees divided into small groups to discuss 2011 plans, the challenges they face, and ways they can work together to overcome those challenges.

“The response was fantastic,” said Janet Patterson, Chairman of the Acorn Residents Council. “People networked, shared resources and began to build better connections within the community.”

Many of the conversations centered on a theme of encouraging and maintaining stronger involvement by people who live in West Oakland, including the residents of the Town Center & Courtyards at Acorn.

Participant and longtime West Oakland resident Nakia Linzie-Shavers is a volunteer for Court Appointed Special Advocates, which serves foster children in Alameda County. “It was useful to learn about the range of services in the area,” she said.

“For me, the event opened up more avenues for other types of programs that we can support for residents,” added Damita Barbee, President of St. Paul Economic Empowerment Development Corp., “which, hopefully, will result in increasing the number of lives we can empower and enrich.”

Shaun Tai, Executive Director of Oakland Digital Arts & Literacy Center, was struck by the diversity of participants, leadership and resources. “What I gained was a sense of hope that with more events like the Solutions Salon, there will be things that we can act upon together as a cohesive community,” he said. “We can’t just keep talking; there needs to be action.”

One of the next steps, according to Patterson, will be the creation of a resource directory to facilitate access to programs and strengthen connections between the organizations that provide services.

To view photos from the event, visit:  http://bit.ly/solutions-salon

Invitation to a Solutions Salon for West Oakland Leaders, 2/24/11

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The Acorn Residents Council, BRIDGE Housing, and The John Stewart Company

cordially invite you to an evening of fun and fellowship

at the Town Center at Acorn

Join fellow leaders of community-based organizations in West Oakland to talk about your plans for 2011, and to explore ways we can help each other advance the good work that we do.

Thursday, February 24 2011, 4:00 PM to 6:30 PM

Community Room, Town Center at Acorn, 1143 10th Street, Oakland CA 94607

SEATING IS LIMITED TO 40 PEOPLE, PLEASE RSVP ASAP

PROGRAM

4:00 PM to 4:25 PM Registration and Hors d’oeuvres
4:25 PM to 4:30 PM Welcome and Overview – Janet Patterson
4:30 PM to 5:30 PM SOLUTIONS SALON

We’ll break out into groups of six to eight. Each participant will be asked (1) What’s the single greatest challenge or obstacle that you’re facing, and (2) What help do you need to significantly advance the work that you do? (One rule: you can’t say “I need more money” – who doesn’t?)

All the other members of the group will then take turns to tell you how they can help you, either directly or indirectly (e.g. by referring you to someone they know who might be able to help).
5:30 PM to 6:00 PM REPORT BACK

A volunteer from each sub group will take notes, and report to the whole group what each member of the subgroup needs the most. This will give all the other participants a chance to know who you are, and think about how they can help.
6:00 PM to 6:30 PM UNSTRUCTURED NETWORKING

Free time to talk to other leaders, to discuss how you can help each other, or just to chat. We’ll keep the room open for you until 7PM, if you need it.

Please bring your brochures, flyers etc so other participants can pass them on to their constituents.

SEATING IS LIMITED TO 40 PEOPLE, PLEASE RSVP ASAP

If you can attend, please email Acorn3@jsco.net and let me know how many people will be in your party (max of 2 per org). Better yet, please fill in this online registration form (it timestamps responses, which makes it easier for us to identify the first 40 people to respond). And do feel free to forward this invitation to fellow leaders in West Oakland. I hope you can join us! – Janet Patterson, Chairman of the Board, Acorn Residents Council (510)444-8942.

Network Organizing: A Strategy for Building Community Engagement

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William J. Traynor, Jessica Andors . Shelterforce 2005.

Across the country there is a fundamental condition that consistently undercuts even the most successful community development efforts: chronic disengagement. In most cities, public or civic life is a hostile environment for the average person, ruled by cynicism and division, and dominated by entrenched habits of isolation and detachment. Unfortunately, while our community development field is engineered to build the physical things communities need — new homes, community centers and small businesses — and to some extent, to influence the policy that supports those products, we are not designed to attack this condition.

The author describes how his organization — Lawrence CommunityWorks (LCW), a CDC based in Lawrence, Massachusetts — is using a “network organizing” strategy to overcome this situation. This strategy connects people to each other and to opportunities for people to step into public life — from the neighborhood group to the City Council — in a way that feels safe, fun and productive. LCW’s approach is a hybrid of many of the established practices of community organizing. The principal twist is the application of network theory, a set of ideas that come from the technology and economics fields but that are proving useful for understanding and shaping our community environments. Applying this thinking helps challenge some of the common obstacles to genuine engagement and helps shape a strong demand environment for change.

via KnowledgePlex: Network Organizing: A Strategy for Building Community Engagement, March/April 2005.