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A Project for Citizen
Participation in Planning the Future of Akron |
Work Group on
Charitable & Religious Organizations
Paula Davis, Moderator
Fr. Norm Douglas, Resource Delegate
Work Group Members:
Tina Smith, Alice May, Chester Decker, Mark R. Sutter, Melinda Tokie, and Michael Gaffney
CHARITABLE & RELIGIOUS ORGANIZATIONS REPORT
Vision: We envision charitable and religious organizations getting to
know one another better and effectively collaborating in fostering a more unified, local
community of concern, commitment and celebration.
Goals are listed in order of importance to the group members.
GOAL:
Bring the financial resources of the government, the spiritual resources of the
faith-based community and the active concerns of the charitable organizations together to
work for the betterment of the community, i.e. alleviating homelessness and hunger in
Akron, i.e. alleviating homelessness and hunger in Akron.
Government needs the spiritual resources faith-based communities can
provide to assist in solving social issues. Faith-based communities need the government's
financial resources to do their work without regard to specific beliefs, and the same is
true for charitable organizations.
People need one place in the community where they can feel totally
accepted, feel and experience love while solving their problems. Our group needs to
make the personal connections.
Spiritual and service oriented agencies can act as the catalysts to
get people talking about life choices, when the answers may be rooted in faith systems.
The faith-based community has limited resources.
STRATEGIES
Find the spiritual commonality, so government, agencies, and
churches can work together on issues. Foster a nurturing climate within the
community.
Pursue funding through taxes. A good example is the recent Akron Area
Arts Council’s (CARES) proposal to the county for a cultural/arts tax to support the
nonprofit community.
Find the moral commonality with the increasing body of unchurched.
Working together does not have to be tied to specific faith doctrines.
Create new partnerships.
GOAL:
Charitable and religious organizations will build and strengthen community bases and
networks.
Develop web-works of caring communities, either faith- based
or nonprofit agency based.
A challenge will be how faith-based communities and nonprofits are
going to use sophisticated technology to increase respect for the individual and community
concern for each other.
Our organizations need to create the new intentional communities
that citizens will identify with in the future. Replacing the neighborhood schools,
churches or housing areas of the past.
There is a definite need to foster within our city's high school
population and college youth a sense of the world needs, a desire to serve their community
and a desire to volunteer. Give them a sense of responsibility for the future of their
community!
STRATEGIES:
Set up geographic sectors for providing personal care
Determine how to coordinate community bases, based on geographic
sectors, around faith affiliation, mutual commonality – interests, clubs, family
units, etc.
RESOURCES:
Use technology to keep in touch with people.
Improved data bases, web shopping capabilities, picture/sound
capabilities will make it easier to help people and identify their needs. We must make
sure individuals not on-line do not get left out of community services. That may become
the job of charitable and religious organizations.
GOAL:
Charitable and religious organizations need to develop and maintain communication
technology.
Nonprofits and religious organizations are already behind the curve
for incorporating technology, software, and training into their businesses due to staffing
and money restraints. The community forces need to get them up to speed and allow them to
reap the benefits of the internet.
Virtual volunteering will be a factor.
Our constituents must provide the human connections which will
be lacking in the internet delivery of all types of services
Our children's newest neighborhood is the Web. Through the web, we
need to reach them spiritually and get them involved in their community.
Create intentional communities through the internet for human
caring
Technology may help the community in avoiding duplication of services
and filling the voids in the delivery of services to the disadvantaged.
GOAL:
Insuring the ongoing financial stability of religious and charitable organizations.
Executive Directors are taking too much time away from their mission
to fundraise, so we should be providing networks, so that long-term funding won't be such
a burden.
Be cognizant that there is local competition among nonprofits for
dollars, in addition to the national agencies.
Akron has lost large corporations and must now, and in the future,
get the same level of financial support from more smaller companies. How do they know the
existing needs of the nonprofit sector? We feel this can happen through the internet,
community forums, and improved communication coverage.
In the technological blitz, we cannot forget the need for
face-to-face appeals, the effectiveness of the old-fashioned door- to door approach to
fundraising.
STRATEGIES:
Create a community-wide endowment, possibly forming a new
foundation.
Create a core committee of non-profits to explore sharing
resources.... an incubator for sharing facilities, staff, technology . . . mentoring
new nonprofits . . . and then launching them to carry out their mission in the community.
GOAL:
Charitable and religious organizations will initiate community SUMMIT meetings.
Improve collaboration between nonprofit agencies. Acknowledge the value
of collaborating by creating councils within faiths and service areas.
There is, and will be, a need for outreach programs and urban
missions.
Promote a stronger sense of stewardship through workshops, summit
meetings, and retreats to impact a universal mission.
Create ways to foster common values individually and corporately.
Act as a voice of conscience within the community by raising the
spiritual aspect of important civic issues.
Don't forget to consider how the commercial and retail sectors can be
involved. Businesses are part of the community too.
STRATEGIES:
A short term strategy would be to get existing faith-based groups dialoguing
with unchurched groups about commonality (Akron Area Association of Churches, Interfaith
Council, etc.) We need to look for connections in faith, searching for universal values:
respect, responsibility for actions, forgiveness, integrity, hope and/or love. Ethics
education needs to be grounded. Youth are not always getting this in the home.
Foster connections and discover the underlying sense of shared
values.
Change the paradigm of more meetings to attend equals more work, to
one joint group meeting that will lessen the workload by sharing the mission
projects and addressing the same issues as a community.
Possible Summit topics:
GOAL:
Charitable and religious organizations will spearhead a coalition to sponsor a
community-wide CELEBRATION OF COMMONALITY (COMPASSION).
FUN! Celebrating our unique gifts and our community's diversity!
Highlighting one world, one community- our many talents
Creativity.
Demonstrations of LOVE
Airdock, Rubber Bowl – possible locations
Once a Year
STRATEGY:
Using the proven models of First Night and City Faire, which promote
downtown Akron and arts/culture, our event would be coming together to celebrate what
inter-connects us as humans, caring for each other and sharing experiences.
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