Moments of Truth...They Can Be Found! As May 2008 joins this year's calendar, alternate sun and rain mark the climate of these spring days - usually the best weather in the changing season environment. Because of too long a pause since my last commentary, now is the time for perspective.

In our natural environment, rain is necessary to help continue sunlight and warmth, unless in the form of tornado or flood. Like that natural environment, good and bad need balance in the worlds of business, public policy, professional sports, and even politics!

First, the good v. the bad in the recent session of the Maryland Legislature: Some of the bad obscured the good, particularly in "rhetoric" politics blotting out fiscal discipline and insufficient action to reduce spending by the decision makers on the first and second floors of Maryland's historic capital building.

The difference between truth and rhetoric is not always easy to find. However, one example of citizen action to successfully cut off the rhetoric: defeat of the computer/tech tax passed behind closed doors of the so-called "special session" of November 2007. Action by small businesses and individual citizens put the heat on through a "moment of truth". Hundreds of computer service firms would exit Maryland to more favorable business climates in surrounding Virginia, Delaware and Pennsylvania.

Professionally and personally engaged in this battle, I found it meaningful to be part of putting the heat on politicians who seemed to be running towards the nearest exit. With the leadership of Maryland Computer Services Association, led by computer executive Tom Loveland working in tandem with organizations like the State Chamber of Commerce, the exit doors of escape were closed! Tom Loveland and Brad Wills, CEO of Wills & Associates, gave meaning to the word "teamwork".

"Moments of truth" can be found in unexpected ways, and some recent experiences give meaning to those moments:

TWO GIFTS BY THE HOUSE OF RUTH: MOMENTS OF TRUTH

Each year, Baltimore is reminded of the important work of The House of Ruth in its battle for the protection of battered women. An annual fundraiser helps this organization achieve its goal of helping these women and their children find safety and security. That goal was given meaning by an honoree of the meeting, Lisa Spicknall, whose story of her husband's abuse towards her and her children ended with his murder of those two children and his suicide. Her commitment to work with the House of Ruth to stop violence such as she experienced gave strength to all of us who heard her.

The legal system often moves too slowly to protect victims like Lisa Spicknall. It is time for lawyers and judges to accelerate justice for the victims of this kind of violence.

A second speaker gave another story of meaning and courage in a "moment of truth: Bob Woodruff, ABC news anchor, reporter and author of "In an Instant", the story of his serious injury in an explosion from an explosive device north of Baghdad. Woodruff's near death and recovery demonstrated courage and strength that has brought him to a return to service as an ABC reporter. Lee Woodruff, Bob's wife and co-author of "In an Instant", brought support and care during an intensely traumatic period of uncertainty when it was not clear whether he would survive high risk brain surgery. He did survive and the Woodruffs' moment of truth arrived by establishing the Bob Woodruff Family Fund for Traumatic Brain Injury. This Fund raises money to assist members of the military with cognitive rehabilitation and care following brain injury suffered in service to their country. Here is a real moment of truth to HELP war vets amidst all the rhetoric of how much their sacrifice in battle means to our country's security and safety.

ARTS EDUCATION, AND PERSONAL GROWTH FOR KIDS IN POVERTY:
"THE CLUB AT COLLINGTON SQUARE": MOMENT OF TRUTH

With cumbersome bureaucracy that often surrounds public education, there needs to be increased attention to hands-on work with kids in poverty, giving them more of an "edge" than their living environment provides. One example is a program of Episcopal Community Services (ECSM), a social needs "help" nonprofit that assists people in fighting neighborhood crime and poverty:
1.) "Jericho" prisoner rehabilitation and re-employment training, recently visited by President Bush, who was moved by personal recovery-in-progress through a positive reemployment rate for those whose lives in jail brought them to Jericho
2.) The "ARK" program of volunteers and professionally trained social workers who work with pre-school children from devastated home situations
3.) The "Club" takes those kids who have advanced to early teen age, but are confronting the adversity of drugs, street violence, and poverty.

The Club's moment of truth addresses personal growth for teenagers in a different arena: arts education. The Club is in the process of becoming a community arts program, thanks to the leadership of full-time Director Julia Dibussolo, recent product of the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) with undergrad and graduate degrees in Community Arts. She and associate MICA graduate Emily Vaughn recently held an afternoon class based on the paintings of Willie Birch. In Julia's words, "Willie's art and sense of community had a great impact on me. His art and my lesson plan based on 'After the Storm' had a profound effect on the Club youth. In the class lesson, youth were asked to remember a 'storm' in their own lives - and convert their emotions into a visual storm painting on paper."

Suzanne and I were observers of this class, joined by MICA enthusiasts Eddie & Sylvia Brown (whose commitment to art and the career of their daughter, painter Tonya Ingersoll, was the inspiration to fund the Brown Center at MICA ). It was observing and interacting with these kids that gave the four of us a "moment of truth". Kids, in spite of poverty and exposure to violence, can be stretched to creativity and learning by art and what it means to them.

What is the human lesson from this art lesson? In short, the answer is direct involvement with challenges. As a watercolorist and painting enthusiast, I had never thought of art as a means to help young people through their fears and frustrations. Again, finding and facing moments of truth can be means of trying to solve problems. It "ain't easy", but the lessons of art can be applied to business and policy.

THE PEACE CORPS: MOMENTS OF TRUTH

Finally, amidst all the excess of rhetoric in today's public life, real work still gets done. An example of the right work of public policy is the working legacy of the Peace Corps. From its origins under Sargent Shriver's leadership 45 years ago, the P.C. has been a means for young people to serve. Again, the moment of truth reached me through two young people who have and are preparing for volunteer service on two continents faced with challenges of poverty and human loss. The moments of truth are the dedication of two young citizens who understand and act in service to others: Elizabeth Tunkle who has just completed a term of service in Zambia, in Africa; and Caroline Ayres, heading to Suriname, a former Dutch colony in South America. Both under age 30, their work has been and will be quietly done in the interest of helping others in need.

There is a theme of volunteer service and commitment to help others in stories from the House of Ruth; the Club at Collington Square; and the Peace Corps. From these "moments of truth", can we look and learn? Can we apply funds, ie.: real help to enlarge the work of the organizations and individuals described in these three case studies?

Here are two public policy and political action items for your consideration, good readers of Citybizlist and this commentary:

1.) Reform the gross excess of spending during endless presidential campaigns and reduce the length of those campaigns from 2+ years to the focus and discipline of an election focused on issues and not attack ads or excessively expensive media hype. Convert these multi-millions to funding of community service (NOT through new government bureaucracies) and work that directly helps those who need it.
2.) Apply economic and global political leverage on OPEC and the greed of oil monopolies to cease and desist in a national climate of an emerging recession.

If "moments of truth" can be found in good works such as described above, let us move to such moments and push to results where they are needed!  9:15 AM •  0 Comments •