WAG: Wellness Action Group Meeting

The Wellness Action Group will meet in a third community meeting:

Senior Center in Grand Coulee Thursday night at 6:30.

The core WAG group has been busy getting an education in community centers and has come to believe things even I would not have embraced a week ago. Time to get everyone up to speed and get some working assignments out there for anyone willing to be involved.

I'll have a video tour ready of three sites we've visited in the last couple weeks. Here's sneak peek:

Scott Hunter

Come on! Jump in and make a splash for your community! Get involved!

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Photo Credit: Flickr by Éole

HORIZONS: Community Leaders Reducing Poverty
Working together to move from poverty to prosperity for all.

Mary Schilling at 633 3033 or email at mschilling@gcdsd.org

Learn more about the Horizons program http://horizons.wsu.edu/

WAG: Wellness Action Group

WAG: Wellness Action Group
Finding A Direction

On Wednesday June 17 at 6:30 p.m. at the Grand Coulee Senior Center, community members took the next steps in moving towards a common vision for Nespelem, Elmer City, Coulee Dam, Grand Coulee, and Electric City.

The group included leaders from the community, including Coulee Area Park and Recreation district Commissioner Susan Chaffee, Grand Coulee Counclmember Solveig Chaffee, Electric City Mayor Jerry Sands and council members Rick Morton and Birdie Hensley. In addition several organizations were represented: PTA, Rotary, Lions, and Moose Lodge.

The group dreamed a mighty vision for the community: a community center with a convention center, an auditorium, an aquatic center, day care, and more. Why? Because such a establishment would center the community with a gathering place that meets many needs: fitness, health care, day care, meetings, performances, etc. Such a benefit would keep families in the community and provide employment.

How could this dream become a reality? The participants decided that a committee needed to bring all possibilities together. Several people volunteered, including some grant writers: Bill Black, Glen Raymond, Christy Price, Troy Johnson, Phil Hansen, and Scott Hunter, with alternates and resources to be Tom Jensen, Rick Morton, Jerry Sands, Nate Piturachsatit, and Jess Utz. The committee, The Wellness Action Group (WAG), would meet to tour several other small communities who built their dream centers.

With a community vision focusing on wellness for the whole community, a definite benefit would be to provide resources that alleviate poverty.

How do you think a community center would benefit our community -- all of our community, from Nespelem to Electric City? Are we moving in a positive directon?

Please comment. Thank you.

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Photo Credit: Flickr CC by cafemama

HORIZONS: Community Leaders Reducing Poverty
Working together to move from poverty to prosperity for all.

Mary Schilling at 633 3033 or email at mschilling@gcdsd.org

Learn more about the Horizons program http://horizons.wsu.edu/

Visioning: Your Community Needs You

What's Happened?

On June 10th, the Grand Coulee Area Chamber of Commerce sponsored a community meeting at the Senior Center in Grand Coulee so community people could take control and offer ideas to reduce poverty and improve the community for everyone.

The Horizons Project is moving into the Visioning phase. The article Community center meeting calls for another bigger one --Momentum builds for a new facility

in the Star Online notes:

"The goal of the meeting is to gain an approval in principlel for the community center goal from as many facets of the community as possible.

Items up for discussion will include considering:

• what types of facilities should be included in the overall plan, such as a swimming pool/aquatic center, small convention facility, daycare, gym, skate rink,

• possible location sites,

• funding possibilities."


What's Happening?

Community members will address the ideas from the Action Forum and move forward with skills developed at Leadership Plenty to form partnerships (like with the Chamber of Commerce, Hospital, Government, etc.), form a 501c3, and apply for grants to achieve the community's vision.

Next week, Wednesday June 17 at 6:30 p.m. at the Grand Coulee Senior Center, come as a community member to take the next steps in moving towards a common vision for Nespelem, Elmer City, Coulee Dam, Grand Coulee, and Electric City.

Please bring your ideas and join the future.

Click image to download flyer.

HORIZONS: Community Leaders Reducing Poverty
Working together to move from poverty to prosperity for all.


Mary Schilling at 633 3033 or email at mschilling@gcdsd.org


Learn more about the Horizons program http://horizons.wsu.edu/

A Step Closer: Community Center Meeting Needs Your Input

We're a step closer to solving answers to these questions:

Worried about access to child care?

Interested in more activities for everyone, especially the youth?

Want to create an active community?

Would you want to see a focal point of community spirit?

Join other community members from Nespelem, Elmer City, Coulee Dam, Grand Coulee, and Electric City at the Coulee Dam Community Church on Thursday, March 26th at 5:30.

If you step up to add your input, YOU can help make all of these a reality.

Please leave your footprint on a positive future for our community.

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Photo Credit:
Flickr Commons by szeretlek_ma beginning and mattbuck4950 end

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HORIZONS: Community Leaders Reducing Poverty
Working together to move from poverty to prosperity for all.


Mary Schilling at 633 3033 or email at mschilling@gcdsd.org


Learn more about the Horizons program http://horizons.wsu.edu/

Coulee Stuff: Resources when you need them

Shelly Stine, Lake Roosevelt High School Resource Room Teacher and community member for almost thirty years, envisioned one place people could find information when needed. Situations arise in which health care, employment opportunity, or child care information is needed immediately.

With five towns, four counties, and a tribal government encompassing our area, people don't often know where the services exist.

As part of her Masters Degree from Washington State University, she searched out that collection of resources for her hometown and the families that needed them. She published a booklet and disseminated the information. Yet, the information still seemed elusive.

Shelly joined the HORIZONS Project and discovered that her work fed right into one of the group's goals: a centralized information area for people in need of services.

An action team formed, comprised of Roberta Haines, Alan Cain, Sheri Edwards, and Shelly. After discussion during HORIZONS meetings and as a committee, the team created a wiki (PB Wiki -- for Peanut Butter Wiki) that could easily be updated collaboratively and available any place with Internet access. The team's dream includes kiosks and a published booklet. The goal is to provide information in a central as well as frequently visited areas so access is available for people who need to find the information.

If you have information that needs to be added, or if you have a need for information, please contact Shelly Stine, whose vision has provided not only the heart of the project, but also the focus for the future.

And, please, visit the site and offer suggestions; we're just starting -- but what a start, thanks to Shelly. She's an example of a community leader committed to finding many ways to reduce poverty.

Welcome to Coulee Stuff !

A resource guide for needed services for health, families, emergencies, etc.

http://couleestuff.pbwiki.com/

HORIZONS: Community Leaders Reducing Poverty
Working together to move from poverty to prosperity for all.

All Things Are Possible

On Thursday, December 11th, Jesse Utz facilitated members of previous Study Circles to share the dialogues of the different group suggestions to move the community forward in an effort to reduce poverty. Each group presented its ideas.

The Sunday group, led by Kevin Lind, imagined that our community could be "A community welcoming opportunity and tradition."




Mary Schilling explained that her Thursday group envisioned this community as embracing the ideals of "unity, harmony, growth, vision, and opportunity."


Another Thursday Study Circle team, explained by Bob Lambert, discovered that this community already supports many resources, including food banks and transportation systems, but that not everyone knows about them. People are unaware partly because of the many different entities represented by our community: five towns, four counties, two park systems, and the Colville Conferderated Tribes. Shelly Stine already has created a resource book based on these areas.

The consensus of this grass-roots group of engaged citizens is to consider these possibilites:
a community center, economic development, child care, community resource guide, elderly care, and town consolidation.



Next, the participants chose areas of focus to begin a process of problem-solving. Each Action Team/Task Force will recruit more people to be involved; the goal is to energize the community into actions needed to complete the solutions.

Rick Morton's comment summed up the general feeling of hope: "If we can make a sense of community, then maybe we can progress to unity."

With that idea, and with new members (hopefully YOU), these task forces will
begin the basic actions:

Future Action Meetings

Community Center
Focus Leader: Mary Schilling
Amanda Poch
Steve Carson

Next meeting:
January 8th
5:30 PM
Siam

Resource Guide and Resource Center
Focus Leader: Shelly Stine
Alan Cain
Sheri Edwards
Roberta Haines

Next meeting:
January 8th
5:30 PM
Alan’s

Economic Development
Focus Leader: Rick Morton
Scott Hunter

Next meeting:
January 8th
7:00 PM
Rick’s

Child Care
Focus Leader: Kevin Lind

Next meeting:
January 24th
2:00 PM
Town Hall Meeting
Community Church, Coulee Dam

Future Teams:
Town Consolidation
Elderly Care

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Finally, Nate Piturachsatit explained that the Leadership Plenty Team (Amanda Poch, Jesse Utz, and Nate) will begin training community members in civic skills to identify problems and plan actions to solve those problems. Those meetings commence from January 7th to March 18 with clock hours available. Come to some or all of the meetings at the Community Church to develop skills that will benefit you in many ways: personal, community, work, politics, etc.

This is a process -- not all citizens have participated in every meeting, but each knows that the goal is to engage the citizens of this community to help solve the problems of poverty by participating on three levels as each citizen can: individual, group, and community. The action/task groups above are starting points, and not all members will attend all meetings. So, please, consider attending some of the meetings to help out. Contact Mary Schilling at 633 3033 or mschilling@gcdsd.org

Come help develop the "unity" in "community."

As Amanda Poch understands after her training, "All things are possible."

Join us:

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HORIZONS: Community Leaders Reducing Poverty
Working together to move from poverty to prosperity for all.

Contact Mary Schilling at 633 3033 or mschilling@gcdsd.org

Community Meeting: We Need You!

Please come to be heard!

We need your input.

Contact: mschilling@gcdsd.org

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