Another group with Best Intentions

Align Southern Indiana: ANOTHER Group

BEST OF LUCK!

Another community group. Working to pull leaders together. Interesting indeed. Maybe a little redundant but interesting nonetheless. 

Good Luck. I honestly hope it works. I really do. There is a major breakdown in a large vision for the benefit of all the communities for the items Align SI is working towards. And working to bring together all the community organizations with a common goal. Interesting. It could work, but baby steps is the way to go. 

LINK: Align SI working to unify organizations

But here is the problem. Without local elected leaders buying into this thing, it's success will be extremely limited.

Most of our city councilmen never leave their city nor care about what happens outside of it. County Council are too worried about money to have a vision. County Commissioners are either too beat down to continue or too busy trying to fix their county to pay attention. The Mayors are either too consumed with personal achievement trying to realize their vision or too proud (some would say stubborn) to work with neighbors.

The first time local community/organization leaders who are involved with this get threatened by those who are elected that don't like a plan, the organization/community leaders will back away. This is because they are scared of what might happen if they have a different opinion than their elected counterparts. They don't want to be on anyone's sh*tlist, so to speak. 

"What?!?" You say... "This really happens?"

Yes, this happens everyday. There is no healthy debate when it comes to local issues. If I'm wrong, please site an example...              Go ahead...               I'll wait...

There is no "I understand where you are coming from but... so let's move on and still be partners." Instead we have "I don't agree with you so I'm going to talk bad about you behind your back and never work with you again!  Until I need you."

A majority, not all, but a majority of our elected officials fit the description of what I stated above.

We are a small town area. Not as rural as we used to be but small town USA none the less. We are a people who are ruled by personal feelings that get them hurt when people don't agree with us. We inherently get our feelings hurt and struggle to separate personal feelings from non-personal decisions. We are afraid to say "Yes" in a tough situation or "No" in an even tougher one. But that's one of the reasons why "they" got elected from "we", to make the hard choices for us.

Disclaimer: ALL OF THE ABOVE STATEMENTS ARE SUBJECTIVE AND DO NOT APPLY TO EVERY ELECTED OFFICIAL

Here's where I hope I'm wrong. If Align can pull this off, it will be a huge benefit to the community as a whole as long as they are inclusive to all and not exclusive to a few (which seems to be how they are starting out). Sincerely, congratulations on getting this off the ground and good luck!

To the elected officials in Southern Indiana:

Thank you putting for yourself out there to serve us. I challenge you to engage with Align Southern Indiana. I challenge you to have a positive impact on areas outside your district, town, city, or county. I challenge you openly debate and not get your feelings hurt when you are not agreed with. I challenge you to be humble when you are. I challenge you to be a team player. I challenge you to be OPEN MINDED.

To the local community/organization leaders in Southern Indiana:

Thank you for all you do for your cause. I challenge you to engage with Align Southern Indiana. I challenge you to have a positive impact on areas outside your scope of work. I challenge you openly debate and not get your feelings hurt when you are not agreed with. I challenge you to be humble when you are. I challenge you to be a team player. I challenge you to be OPEN MINDED.