HOME encourages dialogue, shares best practices for stronger communities

Housing Opportunities Made Equal will host a forum next month to generate discussions about best practices for community building.
 
Hello Neighbor: Using the Power of Connection to Strengthen Your Community will focus on what it means to be a resident of a changing neighborhood and how to turn the concept of “us vs. them” into “us and them” so individuals can work collectively to make neighbors feel welcome.  
 
For Lisa Auciello, Northside resident and active member of Community Council, sharing best practices within communities is a great way to initiate discussions that call upon all voices to speak up.
 
“The intent is to bring different neighborhood people together, and not just the same ones who are the regular outspoken activist people, but to bring a different group of people together to talk about ideas, techniques and strategies they can use to build community in their own neighborhoods,” Auciello says.
 
Teens and adults are encouraged to attend the forum, and it’s important that teens offer their own insights as well, Auciello says, because they should be engaged and feel a part of their neighborhoods just as much as anyone else.
 
“I think it’s important to just be friendly and withhold judgment,” Auciello says. “I think a lot of times we walk around a neighborhood and automatically make assumptions about what a person does.”
 
With regard to youth, one of the most beneficial things people can do is “to just stop looking at them like they’re up to something bad,” Auciello says.
 
“Instead, go up to them and say, ‘Hey, where do you guys go to school? What’s your name? How’s it going?’ I think that’s a huge thing to being a neighbor.” 

Do Good: 

•    Contact Myra Calder to reserve your spot at the roundtable discussion Oct. 2 from 6-8 p.m.

•    Reach out to your neighbors. Introduce yourself, and be a resource to one another.

•    Support HOME by becoming a member.