Lawrence Alliance Minutes

July 9, 2008
Submitted by Deb Taylor, Chair

Members Present:

 Bruce Ney, Robbie Derritt, Baha Safadi, Chris Keary, Sarah Terwelp, Deb Taylor

Members Absent:

Carlos Otero, Peter Luckey, Bob Hubert, Lori Tapahonso, Mike Monroe, Deb Drummet

Staff Present:

Cynthia Colbert for Toni Wheeler 

Meeting

Deb Taylor called the meeting to order at approximately 6:00 p.m. in the Heritage Room at Plymouth Congregational Church, 925 Vermont. She welcomed Cynthia Colbert of Human Relations to the meeting. Cynthia will attend meetings as the City liaison when Toni Wheeler cannot attend. Minutes of the May 14, 2008 meeting were presented. Robbie made and Sarah T seconded a motion to accept the Minutes. The minutes were approved on a voice vote. 

The Board firmed up plans for the Sept 10 Diversity Roundtable meeting with reps from various groups around Lawrence:

Elderly: Deb T will ask Gayle Sigurdson, Kaw Valley Owl (Older Women's League)

Disabled: Sarah reported that Renita will attend

Homeless: Sarah reported that Loring H is looking for a rep for us

Jewish: Sarah has found a rep and will e-mail Deb the name

Native American: Robbie will ask Venita to attend. He will find out who took Lori's place as the Haskell Pres assistant and we will ask the President to attend.

African American: Robbie reported that Donna Bell will attend

Muslim: Baha reported that Barakat Makrami (Saudi Arabia) and Najabat Abbasi (India) will attend  

Asian: Deb will ask Father Dang. Baha will ask a Chinese friend of his to attend.

Hispanic: Deb will ask Lydia to attend. She will contact Carlos to find another rep as well.

Gay/Lesbian: Deb and Bruce will find a rep

Deb mentioned that she will try to speak with Santos Nunez about possible reps as well.

Board members agreed to bring the following items:

Baha: humus and pita bread and possibly falafels. He will ask his Chinese friend to prepare something as well.

Sarah T: veggie plate and fruit plate

Deb T: bottled water and coffee

Cynthia: coffee maker

Robbie: plates, napkins, coffee cups

Bruce: cookies

The Board agreed that we should keep our expectations low and allow the reps to be able to network with us and especially with each other. During this meeting, reps will introduce themselves and spend five minutes or less talking about their culture and possibly their role in it. If they like, they can also tell us about an event that is unique to their culture or family. We want to encourage dialogue between the different reps.

Board members agreed that we should tell the reps about the Lawrence Alliance's role which includes programs we hold (Police Dept Cultural Awareness, Community Educational Awareness, etc). as well as our plans to hold a Cultural Diversity Celebration in the Summer of 2009. We hope to generate interest/participation for this event. Cynthia plans to tell reps about the available programs/assistance at Human Relations.

Cynthia told the Board about the new online discrimination complaint form that is available at: www.lawrenceks.org/legal/complaint_filing. The idea is to allow people a chance to fill out the information in the private (if they desire) so that they can have time to think out their statements. This saves time for them as well as Human Relations staff.

Cynthia stated that she is agreeable to helping us plan the Cultural Diversity Celebration in the Summer of 2009. Deb mentioned that she plans to call Toni to see if we can use a small amount of Cynthia's work time to plan events for the Alliance.

Adjournment

Chris made and Bruce seconded a motion to adjourn the meeting at approximately 7:39 p.m. The motion was approved on a voice vote.

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