Harwood kicks off initiative to ‘get beyond division’
Richard Harwood, president and founder of the Harwood Institute, met with local residents and community leaders Tuesday night at the H.L. Neblett Community Center to discuss an ongoing initiative in collaboration with the Greater Owensboro Leadership Institute.
“Owensboro has a lot to offer America,” he said. “… There’s a lot of noise enveloping us in society and some of that is seeping into Owensboro.”
Harwood said the audience on Tuesday night is a show that the community wants to be more united and come together as one.
The goal of Harwood’s visits to Owensboro is to help the community step forward and “save their own.”
“Every community has the capacity to do that, Greater Owensboro has the capacity to do that,” he said. “There are already great things happening here, the question is how do you build on them and how do you do so in a way that addresses what really matters to people and grows the civic strength of the community at the same time.”
Harwood arrived in Owensboro on Monday, but has already recognized a number of challenges within the community.
“The greatest challenge that is faced in Greater Owensboro is the inability of people to come together and work together,” he said. “There are too many people and organizations working in silos, things are too fragmented, there’s a sense of isolation and loneliness, there’s a loss of shared purpose and there’s too much mistrust.”
Trying to tackle any specific issue is going to require coming together and working together, Harwood said.
“I’m here for the week and I’ve already been meeting with a lot of folks,” he said.
The Harwood Institute and the Greater Owensboro Leadership Institute will be collaborating on this initiative into 2024.
“We’re going to be meeting with 36 leaders from across the county — everyone from elected leaders to neighborhood leaders — and then we’re going to be doing 16 conversations with residents across the county,” Harwood said.
Following the interviews, a report will be released in 2024 with the results of those conversations.
Once the report is published, the Harwood Institute and the Greater Owensboro Leadership Institute will convene a series of roundtables with local leaders, organizations and residents to discuss implications for the community, explore next steps and provide opportunities for people to step forward and begin working together, according to a release about the efforts.
Harwood said there are two things that the institute wants to find out through the interviews.
“One is what really matters to people in this community and how do we grow the civic strength of the community so people can actually come together and get things done,” he said. “The other is if the community has the capability and the wisdom to do that.”
People across the country have grown skeptical, cynical and hopeless, Harwood said.
“That’s the reality in which we live today, but our task is to get folks together who are willing to step forward, who want to get things moving and who can demonstrate that it’s OK to feel a sense of possibility,” he said. “When we do that, more people will start to step forward with us.”
By Karah Wilson Messenger Inquirer