C.R.I.M.E. Project/Steering Committee/I-Team (Goal Team) Updates December 1, 2015, 6:00 p.m. Community Room, Police HQ
Please note: The original agenda items are in blue 6:00 to 6:15 pm – Introduction / Welcome
Sign-in sheet was passed around. Called to order at 6:10 p.m. by Chairman Waymon Lewis. Thanked everyone for coming out, announced regarding the food.
Introductions of Chairs. Backgrounds of each chair.
Introduction of Chief. Tackling Community problems as a team in a way that can be sustained. Developing strategies that can be taken to the streets, and getting our neighbors to help carry them out.
1. Chair, Waymon Lewis
2. Co-Chair, Bishop Kermit Jones 3. Chief Rick Myers
6:15 to 7:15 pm – Reports from Goal Implementation Teams 1. Distribute handout on Implementation Team membership.
Team 1 Report [STRENGTHEN RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN COMMUNITY/POLICE] – Ellyn Tillburg and Cpt. Jill Daszkowski
2 meetings so far. Next meeting is scheduled for January. First meeting: Creating a survey to get out to the juveniles in the community. Must get approval from the school board to give the survey to the students to take home with them. They are having problems with getting someone from the school board at a meeting (Waymon Lewis said that he will take care of contacting someone). They also want the survey/brochure to the private schools. NNTV was invited to both meetings, but did not come. One person's b-i-l was an SRO officer at Sandy Hook, and will get information. Rev. McCaskill was able to get some volunteers to help with his PACT. Mr. Moynahan was able to get help for his ABCD program.
Advertise the Explorer program that has been re-instituted in the NNPD. Second Meeting: Some ground rules were established. The ELMO concept was discussed. Several of the questions from the survey were presented for example purposes.
Actively Caring for People for Policing – ACP4P
Ellyn reached out and got a student from CNU to come and film police
activities for social media outlets, etc., so people will know why police do what they do in certain situations.
There was something from Menchville HS that suggested that maybe we need to re-vamp our training on cultural diversity. That has been given to one of the members to give an objective overview.
Ellyn Tilburg: What does success look like? When will we be done?
Team 2 Report [STRENGTHEN FAMILIES] – Norman Rush, Jesse Thrower. They have 155 pages of resources that they have identified in the city. Every meeting a member has come with a resource for assisting healthy families. Virginia 2-1-1 System, 3-1-1 to get resources out. A gap was identified for programs for fathers. Another gap was identified in communications. Several committee members identified programs in the City that the other participants were not aware of – need to find out in order to get the information out.
They need something that is quantifiable and measurable. They feel that the goal is too broad. They want to narrow down the goal to something that city resources could be put into. There is another clergy forum dealing with the same issues (the pastor group). There is alot of duplication of issues in the city where efforts and resources need to be combined.
They narrowed down their objectives to three:
1. Identify gaps in current programs we collectively decide are worth focusing on.
2. Develop and / or identify programs to address the gaps that would offer a unified “family” approach of services.
3. Promotion of the resources (internally/externally) by or through: a. Public: NNRHA get resources to families (Family Investment Center – only geared towards NN housing residents) and
b. Private: Privately owned subsidized apartment communities such as, “Newport Harbor Neighborhood Network Community Center”.
Notes:
1) We recommend that we strengthen families by reaching into these communities through use of their facilities to host programs offered, but, as we have already seen, both of these public and private have existing programs that could be supported with city resources. There are logistical challenges, but we can study and find solutions.
2) We would like to have input from the Steering committee on these recommended changes in our objectives before further development begins.
3) Waymon Lewis committed to attend the Goal 2 meeting on December 10, 2015.
Team 3 Report [INCREASE MEASURABLE SUCCESS FOR YOUTH] – Tracy Louk, Donna Grubbs – They have had three meetings. Two in
for youth. Non-profit youth resources, Community youth resources, School system youth resources, faith-based youth resources, business resources, etc. One of the members attended the pastor's group with the idea of bringing back faith based resources, but couldn't get the list.
Richard (last name omitted for privacy) who is in the 11th grade and on the Mayor's Youth Commission (and in an "Achievable Dream") was invited to come to a meeting, along with individuals from the Boys and Girls Club. The intent was to get youth feedback. Many of the youth are hampered by their lack of transportation. Courthouse Green was identified as one of the areas that offers very few activities for youth. They want to focus on that community as one of their first areas.
Richard talked about wanting to get to know his community. He wants to know his neighbors. The kids want to go back to the family-neighborhood feel. A place for kids and their families to come together and become support systems for each other.
Hampton University does a Sunshine program where they take kids to a local church to get something to eat and get tutoring. Richard wanted to go to the Mayor's Commission on bullying, but he had no way to get there. Youth frequently have to watch younger siblings, and need to feel safe when they are travelling.
Would like to see colleges (and that type of school) make school tours and information available to students prior to 12th grade as an incentive to continue education.
Areas of concern include: More neighborhood centers in areas where there are none. Parents who don't have a job being a mentor for a child. Showing youth that there is a bigger world than their backyard. They want a voice. They say that the relationship has to be developed before the initiatives are put in place.
Team 4 Report [STRENGTHEN NEIGHBORHOOD LEVEL LEADERSHIP] – Laura Dobson, John Lash, Jim Moynihan
They met on October 15th, and talked about the C.R.I.M.E. Plan and what they wanted to be about.
There was some confusion regarding what the goal statement is ("Strengthen & Support Neighborhood Level Leadership"). Are we talking about precincts and general areas, or every single neighborhood in Newport News? It isn't the goal team's job to go into the neighborhood and tell them what they need, and how to change. How do you get the neighborhood involved? If they don't want to be involved, what does the Goal team do then?
Helping those who want to help themselves. Philisophical discussion. Agreed to adopt the ABCD model. (Jim Moynihan) – Assets Based
Community Development – Identifying what citizens care most about enough to come together and do something about it. Ministry is called "One Church". Identify the citizen leaders in a community and mobilize them. Not trying to motivate anyone – trying to identify people who are already motivated and mobilize them, focusing them. Strategies: "Talent Search" (what skills, gifts, passions do you possess? What would you like to learn? What would you like to change in your neighborhood? Match the two.) Ministry offers two free resources to any church and neighborhood institution (add to website
directory, and management software to manage goods/services/volunteers). The Community Resource Officers will be coming to the meetings.
What are all the neighborhoods? What are the housing developments? Talked to NNRDHA. Teresa Jones and Jessie Thrower. What do you do with the elderly neighborhoods?
They will meet monthly at Headquarters. They are also in the midst of changing their goal. "Strengthen Neighborhood Level Leadership". Team 5 Report [REDUCE HOMELESSNESS] – Jackie Slade (team
representative) Homelessness is much deeper than people sleeping on the street. Guest: Pearlie Jet, who has worked with the homeless, to include centralizing the homeless, and trying to get the cities to work together. How they can help the homeless on all levels. (veterans, single mothers, those who want the services) The homeless population has different needs. What does the City consider homeless? What kind of services do they need? They need to ask some homeless residents and see what they need.
Identify and assemble resources currently available and disseminate – Accurate count of the homeless population in Newport News. Centralize efforts so they will be able to help the homeless.
Team 6 Report [IMPROVE COMMUNICATION OF POSITIVE
DEVELOPMENTS IN THE CITY] - Mike Kuhns. The team has not met. Messaging is an extremely technical aspect of the program that needs to be done properly. What is the City government doing? Challenge – Engaging the business community. Need to create an opportunity for them to engage. Many agencies have a PIO, but the message is not coordinated. Spoke with the Chief and the City Manager, and get a commitment from the City Manager by going out with firms that are skilled in advertising and marketing and
getting them to help develop a City message. Need to talk about schools, emergency services, health and human services, and it needs to be
coordinated. Has received the City Manager's blessing to go ahead. He is meeting with the Chief on Friday. A team meeting will be called in January, 2016. If it is done right, it will be a community effort rather than a "Southeast Community" message or a message for only one area of the City.
Waymon Lewis – answering teams' questions:
Measure on a day-to-day basis. May have to come back to the table to fix and tweak things. Success looks like the room tonight. Expected length of time for a teams' work – this is about the effort you put in.
Team 2 – They support the goals, would like to sit down with you and discuss them.
Team 3 – Will assist with the programs, and the Exet program also has a tutoring program.
Team 4 – What age group are you looking for? (They are looking at all age groups.)
Team 5 – If you are choosing not to take responsibility to own your own home, are you still homeless?
Team 6 – Thank you. Waymon can help with Twitter.
Communication is everything. If we can figure out how to communicate, we will succeed. If you have a laptop, computer, or smartphone, we need to be able to connect with technology. Think and look outside the box. For some meeting in the same place is not appealing. Could we develop an AP?
Pete's suggestions: Youth is a complicated issue, but we need to reach out to them. Has there ever been a large, well-thought out Youth Summit? People have things available to them, but they can't find it. Need referral experts that people can go to for information. Police want to know this, so do dispatchers. There is cross-over on the groups. Make sure you coordinate and communicate. 2. Plans for each team, progress, and support needs.
7:15 to 7:45 pm – Implementation Issues
1. Steering Committee Chair and Co-Chair roles
2. Implementation Team Chair and Co-Chair Guide (handout) 3. Implementation Team Meeting Reports
4. Note taking support available from the NNPD.
If a group finds it burdensome to take their own notes, we can assign
someone from the PD to come and take notes. Team leaders indicated they were good.
5. Drawing on past participants
Team 2, Mr. Rush: Some members don't drive at night because they are elderly, others have constraints with elderly parents, etc. They have been encouraged to stay on the committee, and they forward the minutes to all the participants on the committee, and encourage them to at least give feedback by e-mail or text. Keep people involved.
6. Meeting schedule and time and providing light dinner Is this meeting place o.k.? General consensus was o.k. Meet quarterly? Pete suggested 60 days. February 1st?? 7:45 to 8:00 pm – Need for Recognition by Key City Organizations
1. City of Newport News
2. Schools? Include those students who are being home-schooled. The schools need to formally recognize the work that is being done so we can be brokers. 3. Community Services Board?
4. Chamber of Commerce?
5. Ministerial Alliance? Bishop Jones said that their primary objective is the same as ours. Create a better relationship with the police department, and strengthen families. Would like to meet with Dr. Swann to see how the groups can collaborate. It is not a black problem or a white problem, but a community problem. There is a Peninsula Baptist Association and a Ministerial Alliance. Need all the groups to come together.
6. Volunteers to make contacts, make presentations and seek endorsement Chief Myers: Can we get social media, publicity, to say, "Here is what we are working on, if you are out there, let us know." Use influence so we can collaborate.
First Meeting: Shawnea, Maria, Tammy, Sharon, Janet, John (Wright- Colony Pines) – suggested reaching out to the homeowner's associations. Pamela, Francis, Carmine (PORT)
