HAYES TOWNSHIP, MI – There was a hydroponic demonstration bus, a mobile water park and a plan to crash a weekly neighborhood blues party, but the winning proposal was strategy already tried and tested.
About 50 people gathered on a farm at the northern shore of Lake Charlevoix this week in a younger, smaller, less expensive answer to the Mackinac Policy Conference, only they wanted to be sure to return to Detroit with imminent action as a product of their discussions.
As a result, Recovery Park — an urban farming initiative looking to provide training and employment to recovering addicts, ex-convicts and other people facing barriers to success — will hire youth and senior ambassadors in the coming weeks to help with outreach in the east-side neighborhood the group serves.
In addition to its farming and employment efforts, the organization is part of a major, federally supported stormwater retention initiative that will have bulldozers doing some peculiar green infrastructure work that may confuse some neighbors.
“The last thing you want to see is them digging up your street and don’t know why,” said Gary Wozniak, head of Recovery Park. “(Neighbors) really need to be part of how that happens.”
The group presented its outreach problem to the Assemble@Mackinac(ish) conference and asked for a solution.
(Related: Detroiters seek solutions to old-new, black-white divide in frank talks at alternative policy conference)
The crowd split into six teams and competed to develop the best idea with the help of young advertising professionals with experience facilitating brainstorming sessions.
“These people had a few hours to not only have ideas, but to package them and present them. They were stunning,” said Stephanie Pool, 28, who designed the ideas challenge with the hope that competitive spirit coupled with a commitment from Recovery Park to implement the winning plan would breed top-notch brainstorming.
“People really embraced the challenge.”
Dean Hay, 46, a landscaping architect from Dearborn who works for the Greening of Detroit, steered his team toward a strategy that his organization has used for three years to reach residents.
Forming a youth fellowship program and hiring senior neighborhood figures would best help the group spread the word on what it’s trying to do, Hay proposed.
“The message is very clear, and it travels, that this is an organization that deserves to be in the community,” he said.
The idea wasn’t as colorful as some of the others, but it was the most immediately doable, said Wozniak.
“Theirs seemed the most implementable,” he said. “They’ve got the track record of piloting and testing the process. And it’s going to create jobs in the community immediately.”
He expects to hire the first senior ambassador and youth fellow in June.
Some of the other ideas presented may also eventually be put to use, he said.
“I personally like the slip-and-slide,” Wozniak said about a plan to tour the neighborhood with a mobile water park and a diorama demonstrating the group’s upcoming work. “The kids will bring in their families.”
The competition was held in between discussions reacting to live-streamed policy talks taking place on Mackinac Island.
The group of young activists camped for four days on a farm owned by Detroit real estate developer Matt Lester.
“I want to be a change agent like them,” Lester said. “I think that this generation has changed the paradigm on how to do that.”
Follow MLive Detroit reporter Khalil AlHajal on Twitter @DetroitKhalil or on Facebook at Detroit Khalil. He can be reached at kalhajal@mlive.com or 313-643-0527.
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