In partnership with the City of Macon, Community Partnership invites you to join neighborhood leaders in an enlightening training and discussion focusing on Macon’s six “Shalom Zone” neighborhoods.
This series of six community meetings will be held once a month in alternating Shalom Zone neighborhoods beginning with Lynmore Estates. The first event will be held at the Family Life and Learning Center at 4162 Roy Avenue, Macon, GA 31206 on Saturday, January 21 from 9:00 am – 1:00 pm. There is no cost to attend and lunch is provided.
Why should agencies and organizations attend?
Each of the six Shalom Zone neighborhoods has teams of trained resident leaders who have set goals for their neighborhoods. The Macon 3D series provides a venue for building social capital and creates a shared learning experience among participants. In building relationships with neighborhood leaders, agencies and organizations will gain a deeper understanding of the issues that may create barriers to their own success. Their services will have a broader reach, greater impact, and more meaningful outcomes. Life happens in the neighborhoods where people live, and a lack of human and social capital is often the root cause of issues residents face.
Series Topics Include:
- Applying Asset-based Community Development
- Understanding the Poverty Environment and Causes of Poverty
- Recognizing the hidden rules of economic class
- Discovering and building assets in people
- Identifying health disparities in low-income neighborhoods
- Improving interagency collaboration
Please RSVP to Shalom Zone Coordinator Carolyn Glover at (478) 319-4025 or cglovercgtc@gmail.com so we can include your lunch order.
More Information below:
What are Shalom Zones?
The word “Shalom” is an ancient Hebrew word meaning peace, completeness, and wholeness, health and welfare. These are some of the goals Mayor Robert Reichert had in mind for Macon when he introduced the Communities of Shalom initiative in August of 2009.
A partnership of the United Methodist Church and New Jersey’s Drew University, the Communities of Shalom initiative began as a response to the aftermath of the Los Angeles rioting in 1992. The original Community of Shalom was created in Los Angeles. Since then the model has been replicated throughout the United States and around the world. Neighborhood-based Shalom teams engage congregations and communities to build a future of hope and peace together through multi-cultural, multi-faith, collaboration and asset-based community development.
The City of Macon is the first municipality to embrace Communities of Shalom in a broad-based effort, fostering six Shalom Zone sites within its borders. The Shalom Zones of Macon are Beall’s Hill, Bellevue, East Macon, Lynmore Estates, Pleasant Hill and Village Green.
Neighborhoods are best suited to planning for their own community. They have the vision, knowledge and motivation. They are also the key drivers to implementation- they are the stakeholders willing to fight to bring their neighborhood back.
“The key to neighborhood regeneration is to locate all the available local assets, to begin connecting them with one another in ways that multiply their power and effectiveness.” (Kretzmann and McKnight’s Building Communities from the Inside Out.)
