Sharing the Vision for a Healthy Community: What it is, How to Create it

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Sharing the Vision for a Healthy Community What
it is, How to Create it

• November 14, 2002
• Minneapolis, Minnesota
• Chris Adams, The Adams Group
• Denver, CO

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Overview of Presentation

• A Message to America from Americas
  Communities--The Healthy Community Agenda
• Focus on Diversity
• Linking a healthy community to health

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Where did the Message come from?

• Dialogue Guide -- seven common questions
• Over 300 Dialogues
• Over 4000 participants
• 21 transcribed dialogues

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• If you look at a community in all of its
  components it looks like chaos. It is like trying
  to understand the weather. You cant do it unless
  you understand the patterns--and even then it is
  imperfect. But if we really want to do something
  about improving health, we have to begin to
  understand the patterns in communities.

--Len Duhl, MD University of California
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ApproachKey Question

• What would make your community a healthier
  community?
• What would make Minneapolis a healthier
  Minneapolis?
• What would make Watertown a healthier Watertown?

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Challenging Statement on Diversity

• When youre going to change something you have
  to go for the real. When you talk about health,
  that is spiritually, physically and mentallythe
  whole gamutits not real because for me to be
  healthy in America you have to first deal with
  the slavery issue. That is something that
  Americans are not ready to deal with.
• African American Woman, Detroit

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Practices Ongoing Dialogue

• Dialogue is not something you do once and then
  forget about. It is in fact the way we live
  together--the way we build community. To the
  degree that dialogue is effective you have a
  healthy community.
• Hospital CEO, St. Louis

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Generates Leadership Everywhere

• It seems like it is boundless. No matter where
  we turn we have people who are willing to lead.
  Provide them with a little bit of infrastructure,
  a little bit of support from other people, a meal
  and a place to meet and all of a sudden people's
  capacities are incredible.
• Hospital Administrator, Covina, California

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Shapes Its Future

• People start to get on that bandwagon and they
  realize the strength that individuals and
  organizations in a community have to make the
  community what we all want it to be.
• Community Member, Clinton Township, MI

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Knows Itself

• What are the social success indicators that we
  want to set up? And how do we hold the state
  government accountable, along with business,
  non-profits and ourselves, to the same outcome?
• Resident, Burlington, Vermont

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Connects People and Resources

• It can be as simple as asking someone who likes
  to whittle if they were aware that there are ten
  kids who would like to learn how to whittle.
• Healthy Community Organizer, Anderson, SC

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Creates a Sense of Community

• Historically government and builders have built
  neighborhoods and houses, but the people have
  built the community. They build that sense of
  community based on their values and the mutual
  respect for each other's values and willingness
  to work collectively on them. You have to engage
  everybody and bring everybody to the table,
  sharing successes and failures.
• Community Member, Orlando, FL

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Embraces Diversity Defined

• Healthier communities have learned that
  diversity, whether racial, economic, in the age
  of residents or in sexual orientation, can be
  source of tremendous vitality, strength and
  renewal. Embracing those who are different from
  oneself can be difficult, but the rewards are
  worth it.
• Message to America

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Embraces Diversity Reality

• Im part of the diversity! Personally, I think
  its what you need in a community. It is becoming
  more of a way of life everywhere and I like the
  way that this community deals with it.
• Resident of Downers Grove, Illinois.

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Embraces Diversity Cost

• I think a healthy community is one that has much
  more diversity than we see in this community. All
  minorities added up are less than 2--thats
  quite amazing in this kind of an area. How can we
  call this a healthy community with those kinds of
  numbers? Those cant be the results of choices on
  the part of people of color they just cant be.
• Public Health Officer, Macomb County, MI

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Embraces Diversity Cost

• We have to realize that some people have no
  experience with residential swimming pools. There
  was a 20-year-old immigrant who drowned because
  he did not realize that the entire pool was not
  shallow. To make it worse, his grandmother did
  not even know about 911 to call for help.
• Fire Chief, West Covina, CA

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Embraces Diversity Benefit

• Im proud of the diversity. You can see a lot of
  different people, cultures and things going on.
  You can see an Asian traditional wedding or
  things like that. Its nice.
• King County, Washington Youth

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Embraces Diversity Benefit

• When it came to my kids I wanted the best
  program. They took the fact that these kids dont
  speak the same language and made a language
  academy. Now my kids get tolearn another
  language. Our involvement is not altruistic, but
  the benefit came when people were willing to say,
  This may not be a good situation, but we can
  make it a great situation.
• Resident, Orlando, Florida

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Embraces Diversity Effectiveness

• To be effective, we must also engage diverse
  groupspeople and organizations not like usand
  transform the broader conditionsthe policies and
  practicesthat affect local work. This requires
  courage, doubt and faith to trust those outside
  our immediate experience, to question what is,
  and to believe that together we can make a
  difference.
• Stephen Fawcett, University of Kansas

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The Colorado Healthy Community Initiative--The
Colorado Trust

• Intent Projects to correlate with Healthy People
  2000
• What would make your community a healthier one?

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Examples of Projects

• Leadership Development
• Family Support
• Growth
• Jobs
• Indicators -- Can I see the Continental Divide?

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Community Capacity

• Skills and Knowledge
• mentoring
• supporting neighbors
• conservation of environment
• Leadership
• inspirational
• collaborative

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Community Capacity (contd)

• A Sense of Efficacy
• belief that can get something done
• Social Capital
• trusting relationships
• sense of connection
• Culture of Openness and Learning
• listening and learning

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Evidence for a Link to Health

• Social Capital and Differences in Mortality
• membership in groups, associations
• trust
• Infant Health and Neighborhood Resources
• social support networks
• dense housing

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Evidence for a link to Health (contd)

• Collective Efficacy and Violence
• willingness to intervene
• stability

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Conclusion of the Colorado Trust

• A healthy community
• leads to a
• healthy community

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Back to the Challenge

• So when you talk about health and quality of
  life you cant get there without passing that up
  because its a lot of injury, a lot of human
  injury. When people say slavery, I know white
  folks like yourselves and whoever, they get
  afraid and they get scared. Black folks get even
  scarder than you all. But the thing of it is that
  you got to deal with that because everybody was
  affected by that, not just Black people. Until
  you can get to the root of that, there will be no
  healthy life and no quality of life.
• African American Woman, Detroit

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Responses

• I think the time for me is very short, because
  my patience is very short. I dont have time to
  march anymore, or hold a sign. What I do have
  time for is to make a difference. I dont have
  time for persons to be in my world who are going
  to sugar coat, that are trying to fix up. I dont
  have time for that. Thats why this program is
  off the ground. I know this is our community,
  which knows what the problem is and will solve
  the problem if the powers that be relinquish the
  control of the resources.
• Community Center Director, Detroit

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Responses

• I think that regardless of the negatives,
  theres a lot to be proud of... Im proud of my
  city. This is a city of tenacious peopleof
  survivors and people who are willing to fight for
  what they believe in. Im proud of folks like
  those around this table who say Regardless of
  what kind of opposition were facing, we dont go
  under.
• African American Community Member, Detroit