[Dialogue] congregation-based community organizing

[Thomas Morrison]

Dear Martin,

> Do any of our colleagues in the US have any experience of
"congregation-based 
> community organizing"?   

Yes I do.  In the early 1980s, I was one of the organizers of a community
association in the Columbia Road area of Washington, DC.  I was assistant
pastor at Luther Place.  We had a lead organizer whose name was Don
Lemingelder (I might have mangled the spelling of Don's last name), but I
can not recall where he received his training.  We church types backed out
of day-to-day management of the association as neighborhood people took
over.  I have no idea if the association lasted.

Then in the early 1990s I was a Lutheran pastor at a Our Redeemer Lutheran
Church in Omaha, Nebraska, as well as volunteer treasurer/developer for
Omaha Together One Community (OTOC).  The lead organizer was and is Tom
Hollar, Alinsky trained in Texas by Ernie Cortez--both of whom I thought
very capable.  The major shift that Tom introduce into our actions was to
move us from confrontation alone to confrontation sparingly used combined
w/ heavy relationship building.  The Catholic archbishop and the local
Catholic congregations were the money sources for our organizer Tom Holler;
the archbishop also protected our backsides from, frankly, the raging anger
of the 18 or so existing leaders of Omaha (e.g., threats of being fired
from jobs).  The major difference between San Antonio (Ernie Cortez) and
Omaha (Tom Hollar) was the very active participation of African-American
congregations in OTOC.  That surprised the city's leadership more than
anything else.

Hope this adds to your file.

To