Diary of a Chapter Leader

VOV update

Last night we finally made some headway at our Victory Over Violence (VOV) meeting. We had way too many events happening and no one to do it all. Here is where we started.

1. VOV - This is a program involving activities or exercises in a small group setting. This is a youth to youth program. It will take place in schools. After our friend, an SGI member, was murdered, our district wanted to do something for our community. There have been nine murders in Salinas this year. All but one (our friend) are gang related. We want to help the young people of this city find a way out of the cycle of violence. One of the members of our district is a 5th grade teacher and she sees and hears about violence from her students. She was involved with VOV in the SF bay area a few years ago. She will help us through the process.
2. "Transforming the Human Spirit” exhibit – This is a freestanding exhibit sponsored by SGI. It involves more logistics, but less member support. It needs a large venue, transportation from and back to SF, docents prepared to answer questions about the exhibit and SGI, security and a lot of promotion. This will give the men and women something to do toward this project and will reach a greater portion of the population.
3. Gandhi, King Ikeda + Book Donation – Our area recently started using the Marina Library Community Room as our meeting place of choice. The room is brand new, has a beautiful view and costs $10.00 per use. It is perfect for us. Some region leaders came to a meeting at the library, told someone up the leader ladder and then someone decided to put the GKI exhibit in the library lobby the same time as the Monterey Jazz Festival and donate 1,000 books to the library. Danny Nagashima (SGI-USA general director) will attend and Herbie Hancock was invited because he will be at the Jazz Festival. The entire western zone will support this movement.

At the beginning of the night, we had to figure out how to deal with these three projects. We are a small area and this was getting overwhelming. After an hour and a half of going around and back several times, four of us were able to stop the “brainstorming” and state what we want to do.

 The youth division wants to put on assemblies at five middle schools in Salinas during October. These will consist of a very short introduction and then break out into small groups of no more than 10 students.
 We will not be involved in the “Transforming the Human Spirit” exhibit.
 We will support the GKI exhibit and book donation.

This is a milestone for our committee. We made a decision, we all agreed to it and we have an action item for the next meeting. One of our teachers is going to talk to the high school district about our program and then we can move on from there.

What we lack most in this committee is structure. No one is in charge, and everyone gets confused and starts on his or her own agenda and we spend most of our time explaining what we already discussed to each other. As we continue with this process, leaders will emerge and we will have a great success for our city, our area and ourselves. Our district goal is that every member to have a breakthrough experience this year. This project will give us all a chance to work together and use it to change our city’s karma.

I can’t wait.