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I have been in the pubic safety industry for a while and what I know is that police and fire services often respond to the residuals and symptoms of many, many underlying social issues. Perhaps a case can be made that every arrest by police is reflective of where our communty(families, neighborhoods, friends, co-workers, fellow church congregation, people who know) has dropped the ball in some form or fashion. I don’t want to minimize the personal accountability on the part of people who make choices that don’t serve them or others, but we are all in our community together. I wonder if there is something else that is disconnected or not aligned amongst us all. Happy to have a conversation with anyone...some more thoughts.
We tend to see our social issues, like addiction and homelessness, as problems that need to be solved by the experts and professional service providers. We seldom have conversations about possibilities undiscovered - particularly the possibility of our community fully embracing these issues. Our current policies and practices are to commodify the human condition and to design services and programs to serve the needs of others. Our mindset has been to treat people as problems to be solved and to view them through the lens of their deficiencies. We’ve created industries to serve the deficiencies of others; we’ve designed educational curriculum to teach people how to meet the needs of people; and we’ve developed institutions that have become dependent on the sufferring and struggling of others.
In the process of this commodification of the deficiencies, needs and suffering of others, we’ve created the expectation and belief that we must rely on the expertise from professionals, depend on leaders, create structured programs, and make our systems more efficient to solve our community’s problems. WIthin this context, we’ve minimized opportunities to create new possibilities in which local residents can pursue a common calling and can bring their own gifts to care for those who are vulnerable, sustain our health, and to keep us safe!
Therein lies the possibity of a different future - recognizing the abundance of people within our community and that we have the heart and wherewithal to be a big part of our response to our social issues. WIthin this perspective a space is created for everyone in our community to embrace our social issues with their generosity and bring to life the potential for significantly more human resources (love, generosity, capacity to connect, talents).
For anyone reading this, ask yourself what your response and thoughts are when you see addiction, homelessness, and people experiencing mental illness in our community. Do you believe you can be a part of the solution and response, or do you believe/demand our leaders, the police, and professionals will and should fix the problem? I have witnessed too many times those who have been educated by the curriculum and work for institutions that only they can solve the problems, that it takes specialized training to help others and that the way to “fix” our issues is to ensure we have more services and more access to services. The need for more and better services is no longer the full answer; in fact I think it has become its own addiction.
And on the other side, residents can no longer be passive consumers of institutional services. We can no longer expect social workers and services to be exclusive caretakers of the vulnerable. We can no longer demand that our leaders and institutions solve our issues and in the same breath, declare our own innocence. This is OUR community - it just does not belong to those who are in officially sanctioned and/or paid leadership or service positions.
I believe that certain professional services are necessary but not to the extent that they monopolize the responses to our social issues or place a choke-hold on anyone “not trained” or not a professional service provider. The goodness of our community is enormous; the resources that could be leveraged are immeasurable; the generosity of thousands of people is latent but delivereable!
Again, on all of our Belonging Revolution walks, Dan Benavidez and I are witness to people every Sunday who have gifts to offer; they often just do not know how to offer them. What we see is that the hunger for offering is there; the need to connect is palpable; the desire to be needed and relevant is powerful. It’s time...
Mike Butler - Longmont Public Safety Chief
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