Thank you Laura.
You are welcome. I should be thanking you for everything. Positive energy attracts positive energy .
The honorable Mayor ,Chief Service Officer and your humble self have a very positive energy, which is contageous to me. I never miss tapping into it,hahahah.I am only giving back what has been given to me. Human beings can be turned into good people or ...... We must do our all so that one day we don't feel that something was not done at the right time.
Compassion for humanity not for the sake of it because sometimes,one is in the wrong place at the wrong time. Every city, community and human being deserves the second chance in life otherwise we are headed to extinction. No , it can't happen.If we don't rebuild, then we are failing to pass on to the next generation a better society. The moral high calling is for everyone to live the city and community better than they met it.
What I understand is in a bid to maximize human potentials, engaging people as well as asking them in any way possible to serve should be a full package. It is like faith and conviction working together to create a new meaning. If someone believes in the city and is engaged ,then it should translate into service. It is what you aptly described as " Labor of love"
The ethics of civic responsibility is influenced by civic engagement and civic service. The two cannot be divorced from each other because one can be engaged but lack a spirit of service. The fruits of civic engagment are service.
Meanwhile the fruits of service are the goals we have set out to accomplish namely through the services that are made available. Services can be underutilized if there are no, people, economic and social initiatives to benefit from those services.
For instance, if the Mayor goes into a community/neighborhood and announces that he will demolish five dilapidated houses and rebuild them. Sounds good but then the Mayor says, well, I need 80% residents of this community to do the reconstruction. Will they have the tool set of skills to perform? Community members /residents must be challenged to realize that we must work together.
By the same token , free tuition and scholarships into community colleges, professional schools, undergraduate and graduate school are services that could and have changed the lives of others forever. If they are available then they should be children and students to benefit from these scholarships. These school programmes are equally as important as social services, recreational parks, Medicaid, shopping malls, public safety etc .
1) Change lives of people and empower them onto a new way of living. This means taking ownership of their own destiny and moving in the right path to success and self-fulfillment.
There is no age limit for mentoring people. Even me, I always look for a mentor, someone I look up to who can hold me accountable with compassion and firmness. Someone who wants to see me walking in the right direction and whom I trust and hold in high esteem.
Therefore, instead of residents and city dwellers saying, “those children and that child", may be a one-on-one friendship and mentorship could evoke a new sense of feeling liked and loved. Every family should begin to be accountable for their kids, young adults and older adults within and outside of the city.
There are people who have never felt liked or loved at all or had someone said, wow, you are good in this or that. If they grew up and were bombarded only by negative energy and bad companionship, it is hard for them to appreciate a new reality.
2) Demolish dilapidated houses and reconstruct, rebuild them so that they are occupied by homeless families.Delapidated houses are usually breeding ground for crimes. We must avoid them if we can. Demolishing and rebuilding create jobs, too.
3) Mandatory after school programmes are places where training and grooming people can happen. I know it has the capacity to cut down truancy and idleness, boredom etc.
4) Curfew for under aged children helps children to focus on their homework
5) Supplying block-by-block thrash and garbage cans or containers will be helpful. Then educating people not to litter the streets with thrash is hard but eventually, it happens. They must be educated to see what difference it makes when the community and streets are clean and healthy.
For instance community clean up days be planned during, which everyone is out in the neighborhood to keep it clean. Council members can play a major role in this. Cleanliness is next to godliness and when people cannot keep their streets and neighborhood clean, how can they take any other thing seriously?
6) Driving seniors and vulnerable people to receive services is also a great way of serving the city. Helping with their house chores, checking on them and just being available once in a while is healthy for them.
Nobody should feel isolated and people be educated to know that aging or old age awaits everyone. We ought to take care of senior citizens. When we traveled to DC,I overheard two senior citizens complained that " The City do not care about senior citizens" It touched me and I felt guilty as though I was responsible for how they felt.
There should a radical approach in how the City and members care for senior citizens because they deserve to be treated with respect and dignity. Some of them have been around before we were born and surely contributed their own quota to the good of humankind.
Etc Etc .
First of all I omitted R in the spelling and definition of Volunteers. So, it is inserted already,hahahah
R= Reformers,redeemers,right frame of mind setters
The definition of Volunteers could be further articulated to expound on the words or themes mentioned so that it aligns squarely with the vision and goals.
I have four more things to send to you later. These are less voluminous since I have already articulated the mainstream philosophy and value system behind this vision for Civic engagement and Civic service per se. Here are the four subjects ;
1) Strategic Planning for the implementation phase especially towards the launching, which you talked about. But most importantly, we must come out with a clean and clear plan on how to carry out all these.
Taking action is always a very important development but the strategy to get those who have to involved is usually more important.
2)Additional fund-raising strategies beyond what Nichelle is doing. I have some ideas and thoughts on this bold step. In community organizing, members are most involved when they sign up their name and become members of the initiative and contribute a token amount. When they put in at least 5 dollars or 10 dollars ,they tend to have a sense of belonging and ownership.
We have to choose a theme for this fund-raising, say Education of Families and Youths in the communities in Newark and identify philanthropists like Oprah Winfrey and other top people like Bill gates.
These philanthropists like to help causes provided they are contacted with a clear and compelling vision.
I know that Oprah likes to support initiatives that are geared towards education and empowerment of people.
In addition, Bill Gates is also opened to supporting education. I think Newark can be a leader in revolutionary change in community organizing and rebuilding the City
3)Training Plan for Community Leaders: You know in order to have a vibrant and proactive communities, we must identity and train community organizers who will be in charged of the grassroots door-to- door organizing, family to family and bringing people together around problems to take action. This is the job of the community organizers.
4) Training volunteers to understand the maitrix of volunteering ,which are
Patriotism Gratitude Reward
5) Director of Community Organizing and Volunteering Also creating an office like this to be reporting to the Deputy Chief of Service will also go a long way to ensure that the application and implementation phase is guranteed. It does seem obvious to me that the Mayor,Nichelle and Laura are very serious about this Service of City in Newark making it very appropriate to make sure the wheel of management is spinning with enough oil of personnel and expertise.
Talk to you later ,laura.
Jonathan Awasom
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