The discipline of mourning takes on new depths today. I mourn for the lives lost in the past week at the hands of police. I mourn for the lives lost in Dallas overnight. I fear for the lives of peaceful protesters who will be painted with the same brush as the Dallas snipers. I wonder how we will recover from this latest development and how we will keep it from spawning an escalating cycle of violence. Praying for wisdom, peace, justice, healing.
I remember how heavy my heart felt after the Orlando shootings, the Newtown massacre, the deaths of Trayvon Martin, Renisha McBride, Raekwon Brown, Jonathan Ferrell and so many young people of color, the Boston Marathon bombing, the attacks of September 11 2001, the kidnapping of the Chibok school girls. There are so many heart-numbing tragedies and atrocities across our country and our world. And we are rightly moved. We mourn with those who mourn.
Every day the news brings us more reasons for heavy heartedness. And yet, some days I feel it more deeply than others. Today, my heart grew heavy reading about the bombing at the airport in Istanbul. Somehow it hits me harder when I know actual people who live in or near a place of tragedy, or know people who know and love people there, as is the case with Turkey. As a practicing Christian, I’m called to rejoice with those who rejoice and mourn with those who mourn. That implies relationship and ways to feel their joy and pain. And, I think we can develop a discipline of mourning, even when I don’t have proximity, even when I don’t have personal relationships. So, I’m working to cultivate a discipline of heaviness, the kind of love that extends itself to mourn even for people I don’t know personally.
I almost wept as I listened to the story of Dylan Siegel. At age six, he learned that his friend Jonah Pournazarian had a rare, incurable, and fatal illness. He rejected mom’s ideas about a bake sale and decided to write a book, So Chocolate Bar, (his word for awesome) and raise a million dollars to support medical research. And he did it! Now at age nine, his efforts are funding research that just wouldn’t have happened otherwise. The disease affects so few people that there was no incentive for drug companies or researchers to pay attention. This little guy thought that was unfair and decided to do something about it. How would you change the world if the life of someone you loved depended on it? How far would you reach if the possibility of failing never crossed your mind?
This is the fourth of a four part series, sharing some of the lessons IISC and Horsley Witten Group learned in our efforts to support RhodeMap RI in weaving social equity into its regional planning process, and particularly our facilitation of the project’s Social Equity Advisory Committee.
Lesson 4: Lead boldly, collaboratively, authentically
Finally, working in this kind of collaborative partnership is unfamiliar for many planners and also for many community residents. It requires everyone to do their best to embrace the discomfort and awkwardness that comes with learning and develop both attitudes and habits that support collaboration. IISC has found that several key values and attributes are important for collaborative change agents to be well-positioned to support this way of working. The attributes include demonstrating a collaborative mindset, strategic thinking and a receptive and flexible skillset for facilitating collaboration. Core values include mutuality and service, authenticity, and love – a deep regard for the well-being of others. Read More
This is the third of a four part series, sharing some of the lessons IISC and Horsley Witten Group learned in our efforts to support RhodeMap RI in weaving social equity into its regional planning process, and particularly our facilitation of the project’s Social Equity Advisory Committee.
Lesson 3. Build the capacity and culture within public planning institutions to focus on equity and to facilitate broad-based public engagement.
Most planning agencies, regulators, and planning consultants are not well equipped to take on the challenge of seriously engaging communities that chronically experience social inequities. As a planning agency prepares to launch a planning process, it needs to build both a culture and capacity that welcomes and supports engaging community members. This often begins with acknowledging the expertise that comes from lived experience, and the awareness that the agency may not have all the knowledge and skill it needs to take equity seriously. Read More
This is the second of a four part series, sharing some of the lessons IISC and Horsley Witten Group learned in our efforts to support RhodeMap RI in weaving social equity into its regional planning process, and particularly our facilitation of the project’s Social Equity Advisory Committee.
Lesson 2. Design the process for maximum and meaningful involvement, particularly of those who are most directly affected by the inequities, and build the community’s capacity and infrastructure to participate in the process.
This is the first of a four part series, sharing some of the lessons IISC and Horsley Witten Group learned in our efforts to support RhodeMap RI in weaving social equity into its regional planning process, and particularly our facilitation of the project’s Social Equity Advisory Committee.
Lesson 1: Weave equity into the planning process AND the content of the resulting plans.
As you heard from the participants in the video above, if you really want a plan for housing, economic development, land use (or anything else, really!) that results in more equitable outcomes, the process needs to reflect a commitment to equity, and the plans need to include elements that explicitly aim for greater equity. Before we go any further, a working definition: By “equity,” we mean a situation where all groups have access to the resources and opportunities necessary to improve the quality of their lives (that’s the process part!) and differences in life outcomes cannot be predicted on the basis of race, class, or other dimensions of identity (that’s the outcomes part!). It’s pretty hard to imagine achieving greater equity in both senses without being intentional about how the process is designed and the ideas that are included in the plans.
We worked with the Horsley Witten Group to facilitate the work of RhodeMap RI’s Social Equity Advisory Committee (SEAC), which focused specifically on social equity. SEAC was charged with offering input and feedback into planning activities and contributing to the housing and economic development plans. SEAC developed a set of Guiding Principles to guide the planning process and implementation of the resulting plans. These principles have relevance well beyond RI.
Principles related to the planning process included:
Do not shy away from frank discussions. Get comfortable with words we don’t like to use, such as segregation and racism. Be explicit about the role that race and ethnicity play in the distribution of benefits and burdens in Rhode Island.
Listen to the voices of those who have historically been excluded from planning decisions and create opportunities for lasting involvement in planning decisions by members of communities of color.
Engage and involve community residents during implementation.
Make sure meetings and materials are accessible.
Principles related to the content of the housing and economic development plans included:
State clearly that the goal of all of these plans is to eliminate disparities along race, class, gender, and other dimensions of diversity. Prioritize efforts to improve the housing and economic conditions of those who are struggling the most.
Make sure that [economic and housing] development is focused on the needs of people.
Use public funds for public good, particularly marginalized populations in the community, not private profits.
Be clear, specific and direct so that outcomes can be measurable and there can be accountability for outcomes. Mandate accountability in the implementation plans.
Make sure that plans for housing, economic development and transportation are integrated because the issues are connected.
While not a perfect process, participants from communities, government, and organizations credit SEAC with making strong contributions to the plans, as well as providing important feedback about the process. You can check out the economic development plan yourself and look for evidence of SEAC’s thinking woven throughout. Stay tuned. In upcoming posts, we will explore three other lessons learned:
On this day of remembering the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., many will engage in service projects – a good thing, to be sure. But rarely do service projects change the social arrangements that produce such great needs. This year, there will be real efforts to “reclaim MLK Day” by engaging in protest and other acts to highlight the systemic injustices and call for systemic change.
In a recent TEDx talk, attorney and diversity consultant Verna Myers shares powerful stories and three concrete ways we can all intervene on our own and others’ biases and help stop the violence against young black men:
“Get out of denial!” Acknowledge unconscious bias; “stare at awesome black people!” and look for data that discomfirms stereotypes.
“Move toward young black men instead of away from them. Go away from your comfort into a bigger, brighter thing.”
“When see something, we have to have the courage to say something, even to the people we love … and not shelter our children from the ugliness of racism. We have an amazing country with incredible ideals … but we are not done yet …
I have earned a reputation among family and friends as being “no fun” or “too serious” for pointing out the oppressive underpinnings of many elements of popular culture and U.S. traditions. At the risk of reinforcing that reputation, I want to offer a few reflections as Thanksgiving approaches. Read More
I wish we would only need that sign in another year. It’s crazy to me that it’s already relevant, and that its relevance stretches far into the past as well. In just the past few days alone, Tamir Rice, Tanisha Anderson, and Akai Gurley all died at the hands of police. Twelve-year old Tamir Rice was shot by police while playing with a BB gun in a Cleveland park. Tanisha Anderson died in a police “take down” when she resisted being taken in for mental health services, though her family called for an ambulance, not police. Akai Gurley was killed by a rookie cop in a dark hallway in the Pink Houses in Brooklyn. Gurley was described by Police Commissioner Bratton as a “total innocent” who was shot in an “accident.” His death has already been ruled a homicide. Read More
Sitting with the grand jury verdict in the killing of Michael Brown, I’m reminded of a blues song that I first heard sung by Sweet Honey in the Rock more than 30 years ago. It’s as poignant today as it was then.
