I was wrong and I have changed my mind. Let’s do a BreakDown on Thursday night’s Danville United meeting.
I know, you’re shocked at hearing me say “I was wrong”. I can’t blame you for that. Let’s bring on a Big Board.
- Let’s get to the big point right now. The last Danville United meeting I went to was 8 months ago because they’re cross-scheduled with Danville School Board meetings. Lawrence Campbell envisioned Danville United to focus on race relations issue and to have regulatory authority. The regulatory authority idea was quickly shot down and the race relations part has now transitioned into a community relations forum. Eight months ago, the city talked about Danville’s blight problem and the coming programs to help eliminate it. That was good, however the audience had a bunch of people in it that vocally objected to the non-race related content. Only one of those people were at Thursday night’s meeting. I’m hoping that trend continues. Based on this meeting’s content and the citizen’s turnout, I now believe that the Danville United has a promising future. I encourage all citizens to come to the next meeting and learn.
- Ron Johnson & John Carroll are excellent leaders of the group. They know how to host a meeting and keep it moving,
- I was a little disappointed at the 40+ person turnout at first, but then I realized that all of the attendees were people who cared and wanted to make a difference. We can build on that of people when we get the word out. There was only one “agitator” in the group and he was shut down quite efficiently in the after-meeting discussion.
- I learned there’s lots of programs that are out there to help with youth and parenting, but they’re horribly underutilized.
- Lillie Jones is amazing. She runs the Comprehensive Services Act program at Danville Social Services and she does it perfectly. She stood up and said “The people who need this help aren’t here tonight. The people who need these services aren’t going to ask for these services.” She’s just as good “on the streets” as she is in the business office.
- Here’s the link to the Danville Regional Foundation’s Regional Report Card that was discussed in the meeting.
- At the end of the meeting, Walter Hargraves asked about the possible sale of the Sutherlin Mansion. It was clearly off-topic, so Ron Johnson said we could discuss it after the meeting. Hargraves got a little agitated, but City Manager Joe King said he’d be glad to talk about it to anybody that wanted to stay. So that happened. Hargraves went into a rant about Danville’s race relations that included Trayvon Martin, so I immediately tuned him out as an agitator. Surprisingly, another citizen came over and challenged Hargraves politely. His rational thoughts and talking shut Hargraves down and that was the end of that. Hargraves was one of the ones who questioned the topic at the meeting back in March.
- Finally, Mount Vernon United Methodist Church was a gracious host. They have a beautiful building that’s overlooked by so many people who drive by there everyday.
That’s the BreakDown. I now strongly support Danville United as they have steered to the center and the people on the fringes aren’t trying to make this group into what it shouldn’t be. I hope to see you at the next meeting in January.
Nice report…good to hear.
Hey Bruce: The third bullet point has a url dropped in that appears to be unnecessary.
Thanks and fixed! Our Big Board was Broken. 😀
The premise of the group was to openly discuss race relations. The initial idea was to have people of all races to work together to know and learn about each other. To realize we are all the same, have the same wants and needs, to learn we can all work together. This is not what they are actually doing., Wanting it to go back to the original intent is not instigating. It might have been responsible for changing some negative attitudes between all races but not this way. Look at the make up in your pictures. Based on what I can see, it appears that there are African Americans and some Caucasian’s. Most of the Caucasians I see are employees of City or of Agencies. No Asian, Latino, or other races. Not very diverse it? Danville United was to be about diversity and working together to get past color.
I’m not going to beg them to come. The group has my endorsement now. I strongly encourage citizens to participate.
Danville cannot be truly united without diversity. You don’t beg and plead but when you offer what is needed, they will come. Dealing with such issues can help to eradicate them. When you deal with them open, then you can move to working together, to learning about each other, and then you learn to respect. Too many people are afraid of what they know nothing about, teach them. Too many have old ideas, help them let them go. The group began with the right premise, go back to it, deal with, and then branch out to how we all work together. Then Danville will be United!
Maybe there ain’t too many whites left in danville who give half a **** about this crap anymore…ever consider that?
So Harry, you don’t believe that Danville cannot succeed if it does not accept diversity? Your comment is part of the problem here. How can you live here and care whether or not people can work together and accept each other for who they are and not what they look like or where they come from.
From what I’ve read about this meeting, the focus seems to have been more about telling folks how they can get freebies from the government and other agencies. I won’t debate whether that is a good thing or not, but it does seem to be an awfully long way from the stated intent of Danville United.
That’s the difference in news coverage. If you’re talking about the R&B article on the meeting, they aren’t going to do the “what else is happening” angle like SouthsideCentral does.
True, however I felt that all the coverage was lacking in specifics. Usually your coverage of meetings is more detailed. Since the R&B coverage centered almost solely on the “help for the poor” angle and your coverage also made ample mention of it, I got the idea that it was the gist of the meeting.
Maybe I’m naive, but I feel that race relations in Danville are and have been actually pretty good.
I believe the African American community needs to work on themselves and move on from slavery and discrimination. As long as you believe someone owes you something because of the color of your skin or when you are criticized for a behavior you automatically assume it is because of the color of your skin. Most white people I know judge people of color by what is in their heart and how they handle themselves in a mature manner. As long as the African American community wants to bring up racism at the hands of white people when something is controversial we will never have a Danville United. Prejudices will never go away. That is life. It is time to move on from the color of anyone’s skin when dealing with adversity or criticism. Deal with the issue and seek a resolution. We need to be respectful of our differences and backgrounds and not attribute our disagreements to racism.