Therefore, while the story is much longer and the abuse far greater from politician towards me, in an event where one would expect the public to support a community emergency scenario, there are few one can depend on as I often wondered why did I have to be the one to get an old stretcher, place two pillows on it, cover it with a sheet and hold a sign out side Town Hall front door with sign reading, “This is a _____resident who has been polticized rather than defibed…” as stretcher and I were knee deep in the snow – where we the other fellow residents – pls see: http://www.bigdiglifevest.com

What I learnedis that during an emergency, a community challenge, I can only rely on police, fire and EMT in an emergency and for that reason, given these men and women and their deedication and service, their willingness to respond to our desperate 911 call as no politician would, guess what, as they would give their Life for me, it is reciprocal. I am so proud to stand with these men and women because my first hand experience proved that most all are too busy, too dysfunctional or juyst plain selfish, yet affecting them directly, certainly clamoring for help!

God Bless our men and women, our first responders and a sincere thank you to all our men and women serving in the military!

Joe Citizen
Main Street USA

I acknowledge my cynicism. It is rooted in 24 years of law enforcement, 20 years of military service (mostly reserve), and a stint as a high school teacher.

Sounds like your experiences with your daughters are spot-on and thank you by the way. My observation of civic engagement and the politicians, homeland security practitioners, and public safety officials is that a core group does a disproportionate amount of the work and engagement. I’m not okay with that.

I wholeheartedly agree with your axiom:

The practice of honest, open public engagement is a civic virtue the practice of which, I believe, fosters the values that underpin resilience.

I will include greater public participation in my prayers.

Looking back, I don’t remember being all that engaged in what my parents and grandparents considered important to them. I was aware of these things, and credit their interests with my orientation later in life. But, that said, as a teenager and young adult, I was engaged very much in my own life and not so much in the lives of others with whom I did not share familial or filial bonds.

I suspect that many of our readers, as young men and women, began their civic lives in uniformed service to their communities or country. This shaped their sense of civic duty, their worldviews and their commitment to the public good, but in many cases I doubt it would count as civic engagement of the sort we are discussing here.

When I look at the sort of people who regularly engage in civic forums, I too see many familiar faces. But I am less worried by the fact that the same people keep showing up than I am with the fact that public officials use this resource so poorly in many instances.

I realize that many of those who attend such meetings are there with their own agendas. But these agendas often align with important constituencies and issues. Often those representing these causes are seeking acknowledgement if not affirmation. The same can be said for public officials though. Too much of what passes for public involvement is little more than an effort to build public support for decisions we have already made or positions we hold dear.

If we believe we serve the public, that means all of the public and includes those who advocate difficult or disagreeable positions. Even if we cannot win them over, we can strengthen our understanding of what’s best for the community as a whole by engaging them thoughtfully. If we can win their respect by doing so, we may find ourselves even better of than we might otherwise have been.

The practice of honest, open public engagement is a civic virtue the practice of which, I believe, fosters the values that underpin resilience. By learning to discuss, debate, deliberate, decide, and ultimately do things together as a community, albeit a community of interest, we make ourselves and our society stronger. If we want youth to follow our example, we have to give them one worthy of their attention. Prayer may have a place in that prescription, but so too does the practice of public participation.

Homeland security practitioners and public safety officials do see the community as a resource. Engaging the community takes many forms –outreach, town hall meetings, sports and cultural events, and others. Funny thing is you typically see the same people at different events. You have to wonder if the people you are dealing with represent the community or have their own agendas: personal, political, economic, or are genuine do-gooders that want to serve their communities and country. In most cases you see a combination of all –and have to deal with them all.

Dialogue does perpetuate civic engagement. It is harder to create/promote civic mindfulness. That task falls to parents and educators and has been ignored by both. Parents enable an entitlement generation that ask what can their country and local government do for them and not what they can do for their country and local government. Moreover, our education system celebrates high-risk testing assessment that largely ignores civic education. Might explain the typical community assemblage demographics!

Many who have survived disasters do demonstrate a certain post traumatic growth. Nietzsche said “that which does not kill us makes us stronger.” In an earlier post, Philip Palin mentioned HBO’s series Treme and its connection to resiliency. Last night I watched the final episode. The series details the interrupted lives of several Hurricane-Katrina survivors. They cling to their NOLA culture and family roots –mostly NOLA-Jazz and beignets at café du monde. Just the same, Creighton (a main character) commits suicide or as his wife cries: he quit ….and the rest of us stayed. Treme is as much a celebration of NOLA as it is requiem in want of a resurrection –second season on order.

Perhaps the second season will take on Treme’s newest challenge –millions of gallons of oil and the onslaught of what USA TODAY’s (June 23, 2010) Snapshot say is an “Above-average Atlantic hurricane season: Probability of major hurricanes (wind speeds of 111 mph or stronger).”

The Deepwater Horizon disaster does belong to the people of NOLA and the Gulf States. Katrina & Deepwater Horizon provided the people of the Gulf States with a sense of resentment of all levels of government and the private sector. Today, government and the private sector (BP) are held to task with the fury of a woman scorned. The metric for discourse and deliberation are actions and it does not matter who performs those actions –what is important is that leak is plugged and the big cleaned up.

Resiliency is working. Just the same, pray is in order.

Leveraging assets that survive including the will to go on is very important post disaster.