Parishes seen as central to renewal of neighborhoods

Although society's problems are often addressed by politicians and civic leaders, perhaps the best place to start resolving them is within the parish community.

That's what Catherine Greene, religious education coordinator at St. Lucy's Church in Altamont, learned in recent months through her involvement with the Pacific Institute for Community Organization (PICO). She is also president of the Vale Community Organization in Schenectady.

Founded in 1972 by two Jesuit priests, PICO helps community organizations to improve the quality of life for families and neighborhoods throughout the nation.

Training

Recently, Ms. Greene and Rev. Bob Smith, pastor of State Street Presbyterian Church in Schenectady, attended PICO's six-day National Leadership Training Conference in Los Altos, Calif. They decided to attend after Rev. John Baumann and Jose Carrasco, PICO representatives, visited Schenectady for two days in early June to meet with local residents and clergy members, and to analyze the city's strengths and weaknesses.

About 80 people from across the United States participated in the conference, during which PICO representatives outlined their approach toward resolving problems within neighborhoods through church-based organizations.

"The object here is really to get people to realize that they can have some say in their situation," Ms. Greene said. "It's a reclaiming of our democracy, really."

Community unity

PICO works primarily through church congregations, Ms. Greene pointed out, because they are often more stable than other groups within a neighborhood; churchgoers also tend to be civic-minded people who are interested in helping others.

"People who are involved in church are, more often, people who are concerned about the well-being of their neighborhood and of their neighbors," she said.

Churches also have pastors who are strong leaders who can organize their parishioners and encourage them to cooperate in addressing problems that exist within their neighborhoods.

How it works

PICO helps to build congregation-based community organizations first by visiting an area, such as Schenectady, and meeting with local clergy and laity to determine what problems exist within the community and how to deal with these issues effectively.

Representatives from PICO visited Schenectady after Ms. Greene sent them a letter expressing her interest in having them come. During their visit, PICO representatives met with pastors and laypeople from about 10 churches in the city's Vale and Hamilton Hill sections, analyzing both the positive and negative aspects of the area.

"In those two days, they really summarized and pinpointed the problems of the city and the neighborhood, and also the strengths," Ms. Greene said.

Pluses and minuses

One of these strengths was the cooperation and interaction among people of different races throughout Schenectady. "In some other cities, there's a tremendous polarization among the races. They didn't observe that here," she said.

Among the problems that PICO representatives noticed were a lack of leadership and training for additional leaders in the type of congregation-based community organization that PICO helps to build. They also saw a need to recruit more local residents and get them actively involved.

PICO encouraged the pastors and laypeople they met to attend the National Leadership Training Conference. Although only Ms. Greene and Rev. Smith participated, several others expressed their interest in attending the next training in January.

Next steps

Ms. Greene is sharing what she learned during the conference with those who are involved in the Vale Neighborhood Organization and also keeping in contact with the pastors and laypeople who met with PICO representatives in June.

The next step is to promote interest in forming congregation-community organizations among parishioners, and to establish a core group of those who want to get involved. They would then speak to others in the community in order to determine what problems should be addressed, what strategies to use in confronting those issues, and whom to speak with regarding such problems.

Although following PICO's plan for forming congregation-community organizations would require leadership training and would cost such groups in Schenectady a certain amount of money, Ms. Greene believes that much can be achieved by developing partnerships between parishes and the community.

"People in every neighborhood have concerns: about their neighborhood, their church setting, their schools," she said. "This is really a process to get people actively involved in the decisions being made for them at the government level and taking some responsibility for their civic life."

(10-03-96) [[In-content Ad]]